As ordered reported by the Senate Committee on Foreign Relations
on June 24, 2014
H.R. 3212 would require several changes to the Department of State’s efforts to track and resolve cases of international kidnapping and to prevent such abductions. The act would authorize the appropriation of $1 million a year in 2015 and 2016 for a training program. Assuming appropriation of the specified amounts, CBO estimates that implementing that training would cost $2 million over the 2015-2019 period. Pay-as-you-go procedures apply to this legislation because enacting the legislation would affect direct spending. However, CBO estimates that the increased mandatory spending under the bill would be offset by increased fee collections and thus that the net effect would not be significant. Enacting the legislation would not affect revenues.
Major Provisions
The Office of Children’s Issues (OCI), a part of the department’s Bureau of Consular Affairs, takes the lead on the federal government’s response to both types of international child abduction: cases involving countries that are members of an international convention (the Hague Abduction Convention) as well as those involving nonmember countries. The act would require the department to:
Monitor, evaluate, consult with, and report on countries that do not cooperate in or fail to resolve abduction cases and advise the President on subsequent actions that should be taken (as prescribed under the legislation),
Establish memorandums of understanding with countries that are unlikely to join the Hague Abduction Convention,
Report on certain aspects of its efforts to track and resolve cases of international child abduction and prevent abductions,
Notify Members of the Congress about cases of child abduction affecting their constituents, and
Train foreign entities on certain aspects of child abduction cases.