Remittance Expense Minimization and Integrity for Transfers Act

[Congressional Bills 119th Congress]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]
[H.R. 4274 Introduced in House (IH)]

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119th CONGRESS
  1st Session
                                H. R. 4274

To limit the imposition of excise taxes and fees on money transmitting 
                  businesses, and for other purposes.


_______________________________________________________________________


                    IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES

                              July 2, 2025

  Mr. Liccardo (for himself, Mr. Correa, Mr. Torres of New York, Mr. 
  Vargas, Mr. Vicente Gonzalez of Texas, Mr. Espaillat, Mr. Garcia of 
Illinois, and Mr. Subramanyam) introduced the following bill; which was 
  referred to the Committee on Ways and Means, and in addition to the 
   Committee on Financial Services, for a period to be subsequently 
   determined by the Speaker, in each case for consideration of such 
 provisions as fall within the jurisdiction of the committee concerned

_______________________________________________________________________

                                 A BILL


 
To limit the imposition of excise taxes and fees on money transmitting 
                  businesses, and for other purposes.

    Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of the 
United States of America in Congress assembled,

SECTION 1. SHORT TITLE.

    This Act may be cited as the ``Remittance Expense Minimization and 
Integrity for Transfers Act'' or the ``REMIT Act of 2025''.

SEC. 2. FINDINGS.

    The Congress finds the following:
            (1) Remittances are essential cross-border flows of funds 
        from diaspora community members who sent money or goods from 
        wherever they reside to their home countries. While typically 
        only a few hundred dollars per transaction, the total 
        remittance market is estimated by the International Monetary 
        Fund to be over $500,000,000,000 globally. These funds are so 
        significant to the recipient countries that they can make up 
        percentages of their Gross Domestic Product and are significant 
        factors in the elimination of poverty and the stabilization of 
        economies.
            (2) A 2016 report from Government Accountability Office 
        found that fines on remittances did not stop the flow of 
        remittances, but rather led to consumers using unregulated 
        transfer methods.
            (3) In a May 2023 report, the Congressional Research 
        Service corroborated that many alternative remittance systems, 
        also known as Informal Value Transfer Systems (IVTS), lack of 
        documentation and their anonymity and informality can make them 
        attractive for money laundering, terrorist financing, and other 
        illegal purposes.
            (4) A July 5, 2022, Department of the Treasury Financial 
        Crimes Enforcement Network reiterated longstanding financial-
        crime concerns about IVTS and that IVTS are being used to fund 
        attempted terrorist attacks, including against the United 
        States.
            (5) The 2024 National Money Laundering Risk Assessment by 
        the U.S. Department of the Treasury highlighted that drug 
        traffickers are turning to professional money launderers to 
        launder their ill-gotten proceeds. In particular, drug 
        traffickers use Chinese Money Laundering Organizations (CMLOs), 
        which employ IVTS, among other means, to move value across 
        borders without needing to use the U.S. financial system. While 
        CMLOs provide money laundering services for Transnational 
        Criminal Organizations, their primary objective is to acquire 
        and subsequently sell United States Dollars (and other foreign 
        currencies) using IVTS schemes to assist Chinese nationals 
        seeking to evade the Chinese government's currency controls. 
        CMLOs operating in the United States increasingly need access 
        to significant amounts of USD to satisfy the demand for IVTS 
        services by cartels, Chinese nationals, and other customers of 
        their services.
            (6) To obtain dollars, CMLOs work with South American drug 
        cartels and also anyone who needs their underground cross-
        border money transfer services.
            (7) CMLOs are just one example of the organizations that 
        would benefit from the increased demand created by any attempt 
        to limit licit movement of remittances across borders.

SEC. 3. EXCISE TAXES AND FEES.

    (a) In General.--Notwithstanding any other provision of law. it is 
not permissible for the Federal Government to require a money 
transmitting business to pay an excise tax or fee unless the Secretary 
of the Treasury has certified to Congress, including the Committee on 
Financial Services of the House of Representatives and the Committee on 
Banking, Housing, and Urban Affairs of the Senate that such excise tax 
or fee--
            (1) will not increase the potential for money laundering or 
        other financial crime activities; and
            (2) will not impose an undue burden on any money 
        transmitting business.
    (b) Money Transmitting Business Defined.--In this section, the term 
``money transmitting business'' means a licensed sender of money or any 
other person who engages as a business in the transmission of currency, 
funds, or value that substitutes for currency, including any person who 
engages as a business in an informal money transfer system or any 
network of people who engage as a business in facilitating the transfer 
of money domestically or internationally outside of the conventional 
financial institutions system.
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