The Texas governor issued an executive order last year targeting criminals carrying out influence operations on behalf of the Chinese Communist Party.
Texas Gov. Greg Abbott has signed legislation to protect Texans from political coercion and intimidation orchestrated by foreign government agents.
Abbott signed SB 1349 into law on May 24, after the House passed the legislation by a vote of 125–15 on May 9. The bill, which creates criminal offenses for acts of transnational repression and unauthorized enforcement of foreign law in the Texas Penal Code, will go into effect on Sept. 1.
Rep. Cole Hefner, one of the sponsors of the legislation, thanked Abbott for his “swift signature,” in a post on the social media platform X on May 25.
“Texas leads the way!” Rep. Janie Lopez, another sponsor of the legislation, wrote on X on May 25.
State Armor, a nonprofit that advises states on security threats, wrote on X that Texas now has the “first transnational repression law in the United States.”
“Texas is leading the way in putting foreign adversaries like Communist China on notice!” the nonprofit wrote.
Last November, Abbott issued an executive order directing the Texas Department of Public Safety (DPS) to arrest any individuals found to be engaging in influence operations on behalf of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP). His order focused on influence operations such as “Operation Fox Hunt,” an extralegal initiative by the Chinese regime to repatriate alleged fugitives and dissidents to China.
Under the soon-to-be-enacted law, an individual is considered to have committed the offense of transnational repression if the person conspires to or commits certain crimes—including assault, harassment, stalking, causing an individual to leave or be confined in the United States, or retaliating against someone for engaging in protected First Amendment activities—on behalf of a foreign government or foreign terrorist organization, according to an analysis of the bill.
“The penalty for transnational repression is one category higher than the most serious offense of trafficking of persons, assault, aggravated assault, harassment, stalking, or compelling prostitution that was committed or conspired to be committed, except if the most serious offense is a felony of the first degree, the offense is a felony of the first degree with a minimum term of confinement of 15 years,” the analysis reads.
The new law also makes it a second-degree felony for anyone acting on behalf of a foreign government or terrorist organization to investigate, monitor, or surveil someone in Texas in order to stop them from breaking a foreign law.
In China, the communist regime often invokes the “subversion of state power, “protection of state secrets,” and “picking quarrels and provoking trouble” clauses in its laws to silence and imprison critics and dissidents of Beijing.
The new law requires the DPS to create a training program on transnational repression for peace officers before April 1, 2026. The program will assist officers in identifying and responding to transnational repression, developing prevention methods, reporting it, and understanding which communities are frequently targeted.
The law also requires the DPS to conduct a study on the threat posed by transnational repression in collaboration with the governor’s office. The study, which will also include recommendations, must be submitted to each member of the state Legislature by March 1, 2026.The FBI’s field office in Houston has been issuing warnings on social media about Beijing’s transnational repression since January last year.
“The government of the People’s Republic of China may be physically intimidating, cyberstalking, and harassing Chinese citizens, U.S. citizens, and families of dissidents who speak out against the Chinese Communist Party in Texas,” the FBI stated in one such warning on X in April. It also provided a number for potential victims in the Houston area to call.
At a state House committee hearing on the legislation in April, Sunny Cheung, an activist from Hong Kong and a fellow for China Studies at The Jamestown Foundation, testified in favor of the bill by pointing to street violence in San Francisco during CCP leader Xi Jinping’s visit in 2023. At the time, pro-CCP supporters attacked peaceful demonstrators who were there to protest against the atrocities and human rights violations committed by the Chinese regime.
Cheung said the local police in San Francisco “rarely executed or tried to do any kind of law enforcement” to protect peaceful protesters.
“So you can see that the limitation by only merely designating the FBI to handle this problem [of transnational repression], it should be the local law enforcement, and this problem should be addressed properly at the state level,” Cheung said.
Kelly Currie, a member of State Armor’s advisory board and former ambassador-at-large for Global Women’s Issues, also testified in support of the legislation at the hearing.
“Both the Biden and Trump administrations have pursued efforts to counter transnational repression domestically here in the United States, including with the FBI, but the FBI cannot and should not be the first line of defense for Texans targeted by these maligned foreign actors,” Currie said.
“We all know that state and local law enforcement are the frontline first responders; unfortunately, they are not prepared to deal with this challenge.”
Currie highlighted a case in Arizona and how the CCP allegedly hired drug cartel members to harass a citizen “who was engaged in lawful human rights advocacy.” The cartel threatened him and his family, forcing them to “relocate numerous times and hire private security,” she said.
“This legislation builds on a national, bipartisan effort that seeks to protect Americans and our open society from regimes that seek to harm our citizens, legal permanent residents, and individuals who are legally seeking refuge in this country,” Currie said.