The Backlash Reaches Congress: The No FLOCK Act
Two members of Congress — one from each party — want to tie federal highway money to how states use license plate readers. The bill is new and its odds are uncertain. What matters is that the fight against warrantless ALPR surveillance is now bipartisan, and national.
On September 15, 2026, Representatives Raja Krishnamoorthi (D-Illinois) and Michael Cloud (R-Texas) introduced the No FLOCK Act — the “No Federal License-Plate Observation and Camera Keeping Act.” It is the clearest sign yet that the backlash building in county commission rooms — including across the Cape Fear — has reached Washington, and that it does not sort neatly by party.
What the bill actually does
The No FLOCK Act does not ban a single camera. It works through the one lever the federal government reliably holds over the states: highway money. Under the bill, a state must enact laws limiting automated license plate readers to a short list of specific purposes. After a two-fiscal-year grace period, any state without those limits in place would lose 10 percent of its federal surface-transportation funding (the apportionment under Section 104(b) of Title 23) each year until it complies.
The permitted uses the bill would require states to write into law:
- enforcing toll systems;
- identifying stolen vehicles;
- locating missing or endangered people;
- identifying vehicles registered to people with warrants for felony offenses; and
- investigating vehicles involved in felony offenses.
Notice what is not on that list: routine traffic enforcement, immigration sweeps, or a one-word “Intel” typed into a search box. The sponsors’ stated reason was blunt. The bill follows a Washington Post investigation that identified at least 69 police officials accused of, charged with, or convicted of misusing Flock or other plate-reader systems — many to track wives, girlfriends, ex-partners, and acquaintances. “They must not become tools for officers to stalk ex-partners or spy on people for personal reasons,” Krishnamoorthi said. Cloud framed it in Fourth Amendment terms: “Taxpayers shouldn’t be forced to fund the shredding of their own civil liberties.”
It isn’t the only bill — and that’s the real story
One newly filed bill, on its own, is easy to dismiss. This one should not be, because it is not alone. Two weeks earlier, Rep. Thomas Massie (R-Kentucky) introduced the Flock-Off Act (H.R. 10221), which would bar federal funds from buying or operating ALPR and biometric surveillance cameras. Its original cosponsors run straight across the spectrum — from Lauren Boebert, Paul Gosar, Chip Roy, and Victoria Spartz to progressive Democrat Ro Khanna. And in the Senate, Sen. Josh Hawley’s subcommittee is running an active investigation into Flock and its competitors, including Axon.
Three separate efforts, in both chambers, from members who agree on almost nothing else — all pointed at the same problem. That is what “bipartisan” actually looks like, and it is why this is worth watching even if any one bill stalls.
The honest caveat
We are not going to tell you Congress is about to switch these cameras off. It isn’t. The No FLOCK Act was introduced days ago; it has not moved through committee, and most bills never do. Even taken at face value, none of these measures bans ALPR — they condition federal money on state-level limits, or defund federal purchases. Their sponsors call them a “first step,” and that is the right way to read them. Anyone who tells you a federal law is about to end this is overselling it.
Why it matters here anyway
Two reasons. First, the five uses the No FLOCK Act would require are close to what North Carolina law already says — our statute, § 20-183.31(b), already bars using ALPR for routine traffic-infraction enforcement, and the audits we’ve obtained show that line being crossed anyway. A federal funding condition would put teeth behind limits that already exist on paper.
Second, and more important: the fastest lever is still local. A federal bill takes years, if it moves at all. A county commission or a town council can end its own ALPR contract at the next meeting — as New Hanover County did, 4-0, on September 8. The value of the No FLOCK Act, today, is not that it will pass tomorrow. It is the proof it offers to any commissioner still on the fence: opposing warrantless plate-reader surveillance is not a fringe position or a partisan one. It is a place where a Texas Republican and an Illinois Democrat stand on the same bill.
If your county board hasn’t acted yet, that is the argument to bring them. (Here’s the model to hand them.)
You’re not a suspect. So stop being tracked like one.
It takes one minute. Add your name — then tell the officials who represent you to take the cameras down.