The U.S. House of Representatives has voted to send the Illegal Red Snapper and Tuna Enforcement Act to U.S. President Donald Trump to sign into law.
The House passed the bill 14 September in a voice vote.
The legislation, which was originally introduced in the U.S. Senate in January 2025, directs NOAA and the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) to work together in developing a field test kit capable of identifying the country of origin of seafood. The legislation’s sponsors claim such a test is necessary to combat illegal, unreported, and unregulated (IUU) fishing by enabling law enforcement to determine if seafood has been mislabeled.
“Seafood that’s caught illegally or intentionally mislabeled rips off consumers and makes it harder for law-abiding U.S. fishermen to compete,” U.S. Senator Brian Schatz (D-Hawai'i) said after the Senate passed the bill in July 2025. “Our bill will help fight against anyone who tries to pass off cheap foreign tuna for high-quality ahi from local Hawai‘i fishermen.”
On 1 July, a new state law went into effect in Hawai‘i requiring retailers to list the country of origin of raw processed ahi tuna products, specifically targeting imported tuna unknowingly being sold in poke bowls.
The legislation dictates that the test use chemical analysis to identify the seafood’s country of origin. The agencies are further instructed to work with U.S. Customs and Border Protection and the U.S. Coast Guard in developing the solution.
The bill also specifies that pilot studies on the testing methodology must focus on two fish: red snapper and tuna.
“Cartels and other criminal entities are illegally catching, importing, and selling red snapper and tuna to unwitting consumers and then using such profits to fund other illicit activities like drug smuggling and human trafficking,” U.S. Senator Ted Cruz (R-Texas) said in first introducing the legislation. “I am glad to join my colleagues in introducing this common-sense, bipartisan legislation to support U.S. fishermen, and I am hopeful Congress will act quickly to stop these dangerous criminal gangs.”
The Illegal Red Snapper and Tuna Enforcement Act also authorizes the U.S. Department of Defense to spend operation and maintenance funds to support other countries' maritime forces in combating IUU fishing through a variety of means, including “providing observers, shipriders, and specialized personnel to deploy with such maritime forces in addition to remote sensing, analysis of data, and operational intelligence.”
