# 119-hr-8306: SCALE Act

119-hr-8306, SCALE Act, is a 119th Congress bill sponsored by Rep. Moolenaar, John R. [R-MI-2] (R-MI); status introduced; PRIA reads it as touching household money (as of 2026-09-21).

- Canonical: https://policyrisk.com/legislation/119-hr-8306
- As of: 2026-09-21
- Plain-text twin of the page above; the HTML and this file carry the same facts.

## Facts
- Bill: 119-hr-8306
- Congress: 119
- Title: SCALE Act
- Status: introduced
- Introduced: 2026-04-15
- Sponsor: Rep. Moolenaar, John R. [R-MI-2] (R-MI)
- Cosponsors: 0
- Policy area: Foreign Trade and International Finance
- Touches household money: yes
- Last recorded action: 2026-09-21

## Summary

**A metrics-driven export control regime for AI hardware** would create an annual, rolling system to limit exports to designated foreign adversaries and shape global AI supply chains in favor of the United States and its allies. The bill ties the Secretary of Commerce and the Director of National Intelligence to a repeatable process of setting performance metrics, production thresholds, and licensing rules to keep adversaries from matching U.S. AI compute capacity. - U.S. exporters and hardware makers would face yearly thresholds, mandatory certifications, and due diligence rules. License applicants must meet third-party testing, end‑use limits, and restrictions on remote access or transfer of model weights when services are provided as infrastructure‑as‑a‑service. - Designated "countries of concern" such as China, Russia, Iran, North Korea, and Cuba would be subject to controls designed to prevent indigenizing AI hardware production or accumulating capacity that approaches U.S. aggregate levels. - Commerce and intelligence officials would update metrics and export thresholds each year and coordinate with allies to apply controls consistently and prevent market backfill. The bill defines key terms and creates a process to add or modify metrics, with congressional notice and possible objections.

## Provisions PRIA read

- New export limits and license rules: cost, high. This bill would make the Commerce Secretary set yearly upper export limits for AI hardware within 365 days and at least annually after. For any item the limit could not exceed 110% of the performance of the most capable item that meets the indigenous production test. Licenses would be denied or pre…
- Annual AI hardware metrics and reports: mixed, high. This bill would require the Commerce Secretary and the Director of National Intelligence to publish objective performance metrics for AI hardware within 180 days. They would also send a classified annex to Congress with any non-public details. Not later than 90 days after each metric update, those…
- Definitions for AI hardware and actors: mixed, high. This bill would define key terms used for the export rules. "Country of concern" would initially include China (including Hong Kong and Macau), Cuba, Iran, North Korea, and Russia, and could expand by a published government list or Secretary of State designation. "Entity of concern" would cover ent…

## Related bills

- 119-hr-9237: Take Care of America’s Veterans Act
- 119-hr-3151: SHIPS for America Act of 2025
- 119-hr-137: TCJA Permanency Act
- 119-hr-2725: Affordable Housing Credit Improvement Act of 2025
- 119-hr-2570: Maximum Pressure Act
- 119-hr-7705: Tribal Tax and Investment Reform Act of 2026

## Sources
- [119-hr-8306 on Congress.gov](https://www.congress.gov/bill/119th-congress/house-bill/8306)

## Related
- [119-hr-9237: Take Care of America’s Veterans Act](https://policyrisk.com/legislation/119-hr-9237)
- [119-hr-3151: SHIPS for America Act of 2025](https://policyrisk.com/legislation/119-hr-3151)
- [119-hr-137: TCJA Permanency Act](https://policyrisk.com/legislation/119-hr-137)
- [119-hr-2725: Affordable Housing Credit Improvement Act of 2025](https://policyrisk.com/legislation/119-hr-2725)
- [119-hr-2570: Maximum Pressure Act](https://policyrisk.com/legislation/119-hr-2570)
- [119-hr-7705: Tribal Tax and Investment Reform Act of 2026](https://policyrisk.com/legislation/119-hr-7705)
- [All bills in Congress](https://policyrisk.com/legislation)

Source: PRIA, https://policyrisk.com/legislation/119-hr-8306 (as of 2026-09-21).