Legislation

The Student Financial Clarity Act of 2025 aims to significantly increase transparency in college costs for students and families. It mandates major enhancements to the College Scorecard website with detailed, disaggregated data on costs, aid, and outcomes for every program of study. The bill also establishes a Universal Net Price Calculator to provide personalized, comparable cost estimates across institutions. These changes will require colleges to report costs based on specific programs rather than a single institutional average, with an effective date of July 1, 2027.

The FULL HOUSE Act aims to reinstate a specific rule for deducting gambling losses under the Internal Revenue Code. This change limits the deduction of wagering losses to the exact amount of a taxpayer's gambling winnings, preventing deductions for net losses. This provision is set to take effect for taxable years beginning after December 31, 2025.

The BIS STRENGTH Act establishes a temporary, five-year authority for the Bureau of Industry and Security (BIS) to hire up to 25 highly qualified external experts to fill critical, hard-to-fill expertise gaps. This allows BIS to bypass standard civil service hiring rules to quickly secure specialized talent needed for national security and technology handling missions. The appointments are limited in duration, subject to a high pay cap, and require regular reporting to Congress on their impact.

The Freedom to Fuel Act amends the Clean Air Act to exclude portable fuel containers from the definition of "consumer or commercial product" for regulatory purposes. This action specifically exempts these containers, along with regulated fuels and vehicles, from certain federal regulations.

The Customer Non-Discrimination Act amends the Civil Rights Act of 1964 to explicitly prohibit discrimination in public accommodations based on sex, sexual orientation, and gender identity. This expansion covers a wide range of establishments, including retailers, service providers, and transportation services. The bill also provides clear definitions for these protected characteristics and clarifies that existing federal sex discrimination laws already cover these areas.

The **Preventing Rate Inflation in Consumer Energy (PRICE) Act** mandates that all large data centers in the U.S. must generate 100% of the electricity they consume annually. This requirement includes escalating clean energy benchmarks, demanding 75% clean energy generation by 2035 and 100% by 2040. Non-compliance will result in significant daily civil penalties.

The Justice for Exploited Children Act significantly strengthens penalties for child labor violations under the Fair Labor Standards Act. This legislation introduces harsher criminal penalties, including substantial fines and imprisonment, for willful or repeated offenses. It also dramatically increases the civil monetary penalties for all child labor violations, especially those resulting in serious injury or death to a minor employee.

The Tax Relief for Fraud Victims Act aims to provide greater financial relief to individuals who suffer theft losses due to fraud. This bill repeals current limitations on deducting personal casualty losses and establishes special rules for fraud-related theft, allowing taxpayers to claim losses in the year they occur. Furthermore, it permits penalty-free early withdrawals from retirement accounts to cover these specific losses.

The COLAs Don’t Count Act of 2026 aims to protect SNAP benefits by excluding certain cost-of-living adjustments (COLAs) from Social Security and other federal benefits when calculating eligibility. This ensures that automatic annual income increases do not cause households to lose their food assistance. The legislation also excludes specific supplementary payments from the income calculation.

This act establishes a strategy to expand the use of Trade Transparency Units (TTUs) to combat international money laundering. It mandates the submission of a plan to Congress detailing how information sharing between U.S. agencies and foreign customs counterparts through TTUs will be improved. The legislation also requires an independent assessment of this strategy.

The Public Integrity in Financial Prediction Markets Act of 2026 prohibits federal officials and employees from trading in prediction market contracts while possessing material, nonpublic government information. This ban specifically targets transactions related to government policy, actions, or political outcomes. The goal is to prevent insider trading within these emerging financial markets by those with privileged access to government knowledge.

The Data Center Transparency Act establishes new federal reporting requirements to monitor the environmental and energy impacts of data centers across the United States. This legislation mandates regular reports from the EPA detailing data center water consumption, reuse, and pollution discharge, as well as reports from the EIA on total electricity consumption broken down by state. These measures aim to provide transparency regarding how data centers affect local air quality, water resources, and household energy costs.

The COURSE Credit Act mandates that the Department of Education collect and report data on how colleges award credit for Advanced Placement (AP) and International Baccalaureate (IB) exams on the College Scorecard website. Furthermore, the bill requires participating colleges and universities to publicly post detailed information about their specific AP and IB credit policies on their websites. This aims to increase transparency regarding how these standardized exam scores translate into college credit.

The Fraud Accountability Act makes fraud a deportable offense for non-citizens, regardless of the loss threshold typically associated with aggravated felonies. This legislation also expands mandatory detention for non-citizens convicted of certain crimes, including fraud. Furthermore, it establishes a process for the automatic revocation of citizenship for naturalized citizens convicted of specific criminal offenses.

The Fraud Accountability Act makes fraud a deportable offense for non-citizens, regardless of the loss threshold. This legislation also mandates detention for non-citizens convicted of these fraud crimes. Furthermore, it establishes a process for the automatic revocation of citizenship for naturalized citizens convicted of certain serious crimes, including fraud.

The Mental Health TALK SAFE Act of 2026 amends federal law to permanently allow certain controlled substances to be prescribed via telehealth evaluations, establishing specific requirements for practitioners and telehealth entities. It also streamlines DEA registration for providers prescribing via telemedicine and creates a framework for psychiatrists to provide telehealth services across state lines if licensure requirements are substantially similar. This Act preempts state laws that would otherwise prohibit or restrict these telehealth prescribing and practice allowances.

The Upward Mobility Act of 2026 establishes a pilot program allowing up to five states to consolidate various federal anti-poverty funds into a single "Upward Mobility Grant." States will use this flexibility to redesign benefits and services aimed at reducing "benefit cliffs" and increasing employment and earnings for participants. The law mandates rigorous independent evaluations to measure success based on specific upward mobility benchmarks. This initiative seeks to streamline aid delivery while maintaining core protections for participants.

The BEACON Act of 2026 establishes two new Department of Veterans Affairs grant programs to significantly advance the treatment of veterans suffering from chronic mild traumatic brain injury (mTBI). These programs will fund research, clinical trials, and the testing of new, non-drug neurorehabilitation approaches focused on improving mental health outcomes. The legislation aims to foster partnerships and independent third-party studies to identify and implement best practices for mTBI care outside of traditional VA pathways.

The Violent Insurrection Recidivist Enhancement Act of 2026 establishes mandatory, enhanced prison sentences for individuals convicted of a "Violent Insurrection" who have a prior conviction for similar conduct. This legislation defines specific criteria for what constitutes a Violent Insurrection, often involving unlawful entry onto federal grounds and acts of violence or obstruction related to election proceedings. The bill aims to deter future attacks on democratic institutions by imposing significantly longer sentences, including potential life imprisonment for repeat offenders involved in a pattern of anti-democratic conduct.

The Fair Trade Act of 2026 imposes new, tiered import duties on goods based on the U.S. trade balance with the exporting country. Specifically, it levies a 10% duty on imports from countries with which the U.S. has a trade surplus and a 15% duty on imports from countries with which the U.S. has a trade deficit. The President retains the authority to reduce these duties, above zero, if deemed necessary for national interest or security.