FinCEN Improvement Act of 2018

Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume. I thank my friend, Mr. Rothfus, for bringing this bill up today.

Mr. Speaker, I rise in favor of legislation I introduced with my colleague from New Mexico, Steve Pearce. H.R. 6411, the FinCEN Improvement Act, is a straightforward bill which will modernize the Financial Crimes Enforcement Network, otherwise known as FinCEN.

The mission of FinCEN is to safeguard the financial system from crimes or illicit use, combat money laundering, and promote national security through the collection, analysis, and dissemination of financial information and intelligence.

In order to accomplish its mission, FinCEN needs to partner with all available law enforcement agencies to gather and share data needed to safeguard the financial system from the abuses of financial crime, including terrorist financing. This legislation builds upon the existing relationships with partners in foreign, Federal, State, and local law enforcement officials by ensuring FinCEN has the authority to work with Tribal law enforcement across the country.

Additionally, FinCEN's current authorizing statute is limited to combating international terrorism, which leaves out domestic terrorist activities, which is just as important to protecting our neighborhoods and communities. This legislation fixes that oversight.

Lastly, this legislation ensures FinCEN is focusing on emerging methods of financing illicit activity, including cryptocurrencies. As the ranking Democrat on the Terrorism and Illicit Finance Subcommittee, along with Chairman Pearce, we have held numerous hearings and meetings discussing these new technologies. While they often have tremendous benefit to consumers in connecting the world, the reality is bad actors can benefit from this new technology by shielding their identities or the identities of those they work with. We need to work to understand this potential threat and find new ways to combat it.

This bipartisan piece of legislation is an important step in modernizing FinCEN to ensure our law enforcement and intelligence communities work together to detect and stop criminals and terrorist networks. I want to thank my colleague, Mr. Rothfus, and certainly subcommittee Chairman Steve Pearce for working with me on this legislation. I would also like to thank the chairman and ranking member of the full committee for their support, and lastly, I thank Katy Strohmaier on the Democratic staff for working with my office to help us draft this legislation.

With that, I urge all my colleagues to support this legislation. I urge an ``aye'' vote on H.R. 6411, the FinCEN Improvement Act.

Mr. Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. Speaker, I move to suspend the rules and pass the bill (H.R. 6411) to amend the duties of the Financial Crimes Enforcement Network (FinCEN) to ensure FinCEN works with Tribal law enforcement agencies, protects against all forms of terrorism, and focuses on virtual currencies.

Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that all Members may have 5 legislative days in which to revise and extend their remarks and include extraneous material on this bill.

Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.

Mr. Speaker, the FinCEN Improvement Act was introduced by Representative Ed Perlmutter, the ranking member of the Subcommittee on Terrorism and Illicit Finance, and cosponsored by Representative Steve Pearce, the chairman of this subcommittee.

This would add Tribal law enforcement agencies to those partners with which the Financial Crimes Enforcement Network already works, which includes Federal, State, local, and foreign law enforcement agencies.

The bill would clarify that FinCEN should protect against all forms of terrorism. FinCEN currently supports law enforcement on domestic issues, not just international, and this legislation would clarify that current practice. This bill would add an emphasis on emerging technologies or value that substitutes for currency in order to address the growing exploitation of digital currencies to move illicit funds.

The financial technology, virtual currency, and electronic payments landscape is rapidly evolving to include means of storing and transferring value that didn't exist when previous laws and regulations were written. This bill emphasizes that FinCEN ought to prioritize cryptocurrencies to ensure that criminals and terrorists cannot use these technologies to carry out illicit financial activities.

Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. Speaker, again, I thank my colleague, Mr. Perlmutter, for his diligent work on this very practical, bipartisan bill. I urge my colleagues to support its adoption.

Mr. Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time.