Chris Van Hollen

Fair Credit for American Hostages Act of 2025

This bill prohibits a consumer reporting agency from including adverse credit information on a consumer's credit report from an event that occurred during a time when that consumer was held hostage or wrongfully detained abroad.

Stop Tax Penalties on American Hostages Act of 2025

This bill extends certain federal tax deadlines for U.S. nationals who are unlawfully or wrongfully detained abroad or held hostage abroad and their spouses. The bill also allows for an abatement and refund of additional taxes, interest, and penalties assessed to such individuals for failing to meet a federal tax deadline during a period of detention.

Specifically, under the bill, the time period during which a U.S. national is unlawfully or wrongfully detained abroad or held hostage abroad is disregarded in determining certain federal tax deadlines, including deadlines for

• filing a return for and paying federal income, estate, gift, employment, or excise taxes;

• a tax credit or refund claim; and

• the determination, assessment, and collection of additional taxes, interest, or penalties.

The bill requires the Department of State and the Department of Justice to annually provide the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) with lists to identify U.S. nationals who qualify for an extension.

The bill also requires the IRS to (1) abate and refund additional taxes, interest, and penalties assessed for any tax year ending during a period of detention for which an extension of a federal tax deadline is permitted; and (2) establish a program allowing U.S. nationals unlawfully or wrongfully detained abroad or taken hostage abroad (or their spouse or dependent) to claim a refund of additional taxes, interest, and penalties assessed for any tax year ending during a period of detention from 2021 to the bill’s enactment date.

Korematsu-Takai Civil Liberties Protection Act of 2025

This bill prohibits the detention or imprisonment of an individual based solely on an actual or perceived protected characteristic of the individual. The term protected characteristic includes each of the following: race, ethnicity, national origin, religion, sex, gender identity, sexual orientation, disability, and any additional characteristic that the Department of Justice determines to be a protected characteristic.

Lumbee Fairness Act

This bill extends federal recognition to the Lumbee Tribe of North Carolina and makes its members eligible for the services and benefits provided to members of federally recognized tribes.

Members of the tribe residing in Robeson, Cumberland, Hoke, and Scotland Counties in North Carolina are deemed to be within the delivery area for such services.

The Department of the Interior and the Department of Health and Human Services must develop, in consultation with the tribe, a determination of needs to provide the services for which members of the tribe are eligible.

Interior may take land into trust for the benefit of the tribe.

Finally, North Carolina must exercise jurisdiction over all criminal offenses committed, and all civil actions that arise, on North Carolina lands owned by, or held in trust for, the Lumbee Tribe or any dependent Indian community of the tribe unless jurisdiction is transferred to the United States pursuant to an agreement between the tribe and the state.

Office of Gun Violence Prevention Act of 2025

This bill establishes an Office of Gun Violence Prevention within the Department of Justice's (DOJ's) Office of Legal Policy.

Among its duties, the office must coordinate various gun violence prevention efforts that are administered by DOJ, recommend policy options to promote evidence-based gun violence prevention strategies, and promote related data collection.

Healthy Poultry Assistance and Indemnification Act of 2025

This bill expands the Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service (APHIS) producer indemnity and compensation program to include compensation for all poultry growers and layers located in an APHIS-determined control area, which may include non-infected poultry.

Currently, APHIS provides indemnity and compensation to producers to remove animals classified as affected, suspect, or exposed to diseases of concern, including highly pathogenic avian influenza (HPAI). An APHIS-determined control area consists of both an infected zone and a buffer zone. Under the bill, APHIS must compensate all owners of poultry growing or laying facilities within a control area, which may include facilities that are located in the buffer zones and have non-infected poultry.

Further, the bill establishes a new compensation payment formula that requires payments to be based on the owner’s average income from the five most recent flocks.

This joint resolution terminates the national emergency relating to energy declared by the President on January 20, 2025, in Executive Order 14156.

The executive order states that the supply of and infrastructure for energy in the United States is insufficient to meet the country's needs. It defines energy as crude oil, natural gas, lease condensates, natural gas liquids, refined petroleum products, uranium, coal, biofuels, geothermal heat, the kinetic movement of flowing water, and critical minerals.

The executive order directs the heads of executive departments and agencies to use available emergency and other authorities to take certain actions to address this topic, including approving development of domestic energy resources, expediting the completion of authorized energy infrastructure (particularly in the Northeast, West Coast, and Alaska), and pursuing the use of emergency permitting provisions under certain environmental regulations.

The executive order also directs the Department of Defense to conduct an assessment of its ability to acquire and transport energy resources (particularly in the Northeast and West Coast), and invokes emergency military construction authority to address any vulnerabilities identified in the assessment.

This resolution states it is the sense of the Senate that the United States will not deploy U.S. Armed Forces, risk U.S. lives, or use U.S. funds to take over Gaza.

This resolution supports the designation of Career and Technical Education Month to celebrate career and technical education across the United States.

This resolution commemorates the 67 lives lost in the collision of American Eagle Flight 5342 and the U.S. Army helicopter flying under the call sign PAT 25 near Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport on January 29, 2025.

The resolution also expresses gratitude to the law enforcement and emergency medical personnel who responded to the collision.

Carried Interest Fairness Act of 2025

This bill taxes income from carried interest at ordinary income tax rates and makes other changes related to carried interest. (Some exceptions apply.)

As background, a general partner in a private equity firm or hedge fund (typically structured as a partnership) generally receives a share of the profits from the assets managed by the general partner (known as carried interest). Under current law, carried interest is characterized (for federal tax purposes) as an interest in a partnership’s capital and, thus, taxed at capital gains tax rates (which may be lower than the applicable ordinary income tax rates).

Under the bill, net capital gain and loss attributable to carried interest is recharacterized as ordinary income and loss and, thus, taxed at ordinary income tax rates. (Some exceptions apply.)

The bill also treats as ordinary the money (or fair market value of property) received by a partner in a sale or exchange of carried interest. (Thus, the bill extends what is known as the hot asset rule to include carried interest.)

Further, the bill deems distributions of carried interest by a partnership in exchange for interest in other partnership property a sale or exchange of such property and, thus, requires the partner to recognize ordinary gain on the distributed carried interest.

Finally, the bill imposes self-employment taxes on carried interest income.

Love Lives On Act of 2025

This bill extends entitlement for various benefit programs and services for surviving spouses of deceased members of the Armed Forces or veterans.

The bill provides that the remarriage of a surviving spouse must not bar the furnishing of dependency and indemnity compensation or special pension benefits to such spouse.

Additionally, the Department of Defense may not terminate the payment of an annuity for a surviving spouse under the Survivor Benefit Plan solely because the surviving spouse remarries.

The bill also expands the definition of a dependent under TRICARE to include a remarried widow or widower whose subsequent marriage has ended due to death, divorce, or annulment.

This resolution recognizes January 2025 as National Mentoring Month.