Coast Guard Authorization Act of 2023
Latest action. Placed on the Union Calendar, Calendar No. 91.
Coast Guard Authorization Act of 2023
This bill addresses Coast Guard operations, maritime security, and related matters.
The bill authorizes for FY2024 and FY2025 the Coast Guard's active-duty personnel and military training student levels and activities related to information technology, environmental compliance, and other purposes.
The bill authorizes the Coast Guard to suspend a license, certificate of registry, or merchant mariner's credential if it has probable cause to believe that an individual poses a threat to others on a vessel. Further, the bill extends existing vessel registry requirements prohibiting foreign ownership to vessels supporting alternate energy production or transmission or commercial space exploration activities over the Outer Continental Shelf.
Among other provisions, the bill also
requires the Coast Guard to provide ballast water quality data to any state or territory upon request;
establishes the felony crime of grossly negligent operation of a vessel when conduct results in serious bodily injury;
authorizes the President to direct or control foreign-flag vessels when a cyber incident, transnational organized crime, or foreign state threats endanger U.S. security; and
authorizes the Coast Guard to respond to cyber incidents, transnational organized crime, or foreign state threats to prevent damage to structures located on and near navigable waters.
The bill also modifies the minimum requirements for various merchant mariner credentials, including by reducing certain service time prerequisites and extending eligibility to noncitizen nationals of the United States. (Generally, individuals who receive U.S. nationality by virtue of being born in, or having parents who were born in, the U.S. outlying possessions are U.S. nationals but not U.S. citizens.)
Written by analysts at the Congressional Research Service and published on Congress.gov, not by Civibrief. Summarized at the "Introduced in House" stage on April 20, 2023. It describes the bill, it is not the legal text.
Where is it in the process, and what happens next?
4 steps remain before this bill could become law.
The record's latest action, on June 27, 2023: Placed on the Union Calendar, Calendar No. 91.
- Clearing the committees it was referred to, and being scheduled for a floor vote
- Passage by the House
- Passage by the Senate
- The President's signature. If the President vetoes it, two-thirds of both chambers must vote to override.
How likely is it to become law?
Civibrief does not forecast outcomes and this page has no opinion about this one. What the record supports is a base rate, which is a fact about the whole pile, not a prediction about this measure.
In the 118th Congress (2023-24), 274 of the 16,565 bills and joint resolutions introduced became law, about 1.7 percent. That count covers every measure at every stage, including the many that never left committee.
This one is not there yet: 4 steps are still outstanding, listed above.
Has anyone actually voted on it?
No. No roll call in this Congress cites this measure. That is the ordinary outcome: most measures never reach a recorded floor vote, and a committee ends most of them simply by not acting.
A vote is not the only thing that happens to a measure. Hearings, markups, and referrals are all recorded actions, and none of them is a vote of the full chamber.
Who is behind it?
SAM GRAVES (R-MO) introduced it on April 20, 2023, and 3 members have since signed on as cosponsors.
They come from both major parties: 2 Democrats, 1 Republican.
Cosponsoring is a formal signature on the text. It is not a commitment to vote for the measure, it does not bind anyone's party, and a long list of cosponsors is a measure of attention rather than of prospects.
How long has it been in play?
It was introduced on April 20, 2023, 1239 days ago. The most recent recorded action was 1171 days ago, on June 27, 2023.
Measures do not carry over. Anything the 118th Congress has not finished by January 3, 2025 dies when the term ends, and has to be introduced again from the start in the next Congress.
Every answer above is assembled from this measure's own record on Congress.gov and from published counts of what Congress has passed before. Civibrief does not predict outcomes and takes no position on any measure.
Vote history
- HouseIn committee, no floor vote yet
- SenateAwaits House passage
- PresidentAwaits both chambers