May 4, 2023–Due Process Institute joined a coalition of organizations from across the ideological spectrum to urge Congress to pass H.R. 1525, the Fifth Amendment Integrity Restoration Act (FAIR Act), a bill that will reform our federal civil asset forfeiture system.
The FAIR Act is necessary because the current law of civil asset forfeiture allows the federal government to seize—and keep—cash, cars, homes and other property that law enforcement merely suspects is related to criminal activity. The government need not ever charge the property owner with a crime, much less secure a conviction, for it to seek forfeiture, and the procedural deck is stacked against private citizens who challenge the government. This
system is unjust on its face, has a disproportionate impact on poor and otherwise disadvantaged communities, and undermines public respect for law enforcement.
The FAIR Act attacks this improper financial incentive in two important ways. First, it directs all federal forfeiture proceeds to the General Fund of the U.S. Treasury so that Congress can appropriate those monies as it sees fit. Second, the bill ends the “equitable sharing” program that enables state and local law enforcement to evade their state legislatures’ limits on state-level forfeiture—limits that may include, for example, higher burdens of proof, more equitable procedural rules, or a requirement that proceeds go only to the general treasury—by “partnering” with federal law enforcement in exchange for a “cut” of forfeiture proceeds. The FAIR Act will close this loophole that undermines hard-won state legislative reforms.