H.R. 6028 Severs the Copyright Office From the Library of Congress

A 54-page "technical reorganization" bill, 12 minutes of debate, no hearings. The Register becomes a presidential appointee. The DMCA Section 1201 process moves to a single political office. AI training data lawsuits are now downstream of an election cycle.

State of Surveillance Editorial Team

Rows of bound law books and government documents on dark wood library shelves
Photo via Unsplash

TL;DR: The House passed H.R. 6028, the "Legislative Branch Agencies Clarification Act," on June 8, 2026, in a voice vote after roughly 12 minutes of debate and zero committee hearings.[1][2] The 54-page bill is sold as a technical cleanup. It is not. Section 6 of the bill severs the U.S. Copyright Office from the Library of Congress, makes the Register of Copyrights a presidentially appointed, Senate-confirmed position, and moves the DMCA Section 1201 triennial rulemaking from the Librarian of Congress (with the Register as advisor) to the Register alone.[1][3] The same Register, last year, was fired by the Trump administration days after publishing a report that AI training on copyrighted material is not always fair use, then reinstated by a 2-1 D.C. Circuit ruling on September 10, 2025.[4][5] The next AI training data copyright lawsuit that lands in front of the Copyright Office will face a Register whose seat is a presidential trophy, not a legislative office. EFF wants the Senate to kill the bill.[1]

What Happened

The bill is H.R. 6028, the "Legislative Branch Agencies Clarification Act," sponsored by Rep. Morgan Griffith (R-VA-9), with four Republican cosponsors: Reps. Mike Carey (R-OH-15), Mary Miller (R-IL-15), Barry Loudermilk (R-GA-11), and Gregory Murphy (R-NC-3).[2][6] All five sponsors sit on the House Administration Committee. The full committee of referral list is House Administration.[2]

The House Committee on House Administration ordered the bill reported on May 14, 2026.[2] The House scheduled it for the week of June 2, 2026, and the engrossed text was published the same day.[2] On June 8, 2026, the bill passed the House by voice vote, with no recorded individual votes.[1][2] A Hacker News commenter who checked Congress.gov reported the bill received roughly 12 minutes of debate on the floor, and that none of the relevant committee chairs (House Admin Chair Bryan Steil, Judiciary Chair Jim Jordan, Oversight Chair James Comer) or ranking Democrats (Joseph Morelle on House Admin, Jamie Raskin on Judiciary, Robert Garcia on Oversight) are listed as cosponsors.[7] That is consistent with EFF's framing: the bill is not a leadership vehicle, it is a member-level priority that the House cleared without a hearing and without a recorded vote.[1]

The bill is 54 pages long.[2] Most of it is housekeeping: a Deputy Librarian of Congress appointment process (Sec. 3-4), a Deputy Director of the Government Publishing Office appointment process (Sec. 5), and various conforming changes to the Copyright Act. The one section that is not housekeeping is Section 6, "Copyright Office," and it is the only one EFF bothered to deeplink about.[1]

What Section 6 of the Bill Actually Changes

1. Strips the Library of Congress as a check on the Copyright Office

Title 17 of the U.S. Code currently puts the Copyright Office inside the Library of Congress and gives the Librarian of Congress supervisory authority over the Register. Section 6(a) of H.R. 6028 amends nine different sections of Title 17 (sections 111, 112, 114, 115, 118, 119, 701, 702, and 704) by striking "Librarian of Congress" and inserting "Register of Copyrights" wherever the statute refers to the office that administers cable, satellite, mechanical, and other statutory licenses.[3]

Two specific changes stand out. First, in Section 115 (the mechanical license for music), the bill strips the clause "with the approval of the Librarian of Congress pursuant to section 702" from two paragraphs, which means the mechanical-license rate-setting process no longer needs the Librarian's sign-off, only the Register's.[3] Second, in Section 702, the bill replaces the Librarian's regulation-setting authority with a duty to consult the Librarian before issuing regulations that affect Library deposits or Library authority over deposited material.[3] Consultation is not supervision.

2. Makes the Register a presidential appointee confirmed by the Senate

Section 6(a)(1)(B)(ii) of the bill rewrites Section 701 of Title 17. Under the current statute, the Register is appointed by the Librarian of Congress. Under the bill, the Register is appointed by the President "by and with the advice and consent of the Senate."[1][3] Before the President nominates anyone, the chairs and ranking minority members of the House Administration, House Judiciary, Senate Rules, and Senate Judiciary committees "shall jointly recommend 3 individuals whom the President may consider in making the appointment."[3] The Register's subordinate officers (Associate Registers) are appointed by the Register, not by the Librarian, and the Register may establish up to four Associate Register positions.[3]

In plain English: the Register goes from being a Library of Congress civil service position (with statutory independence but no election-cycle exposure) to a Senate-confirmed political appointment, with the four relevant committees pre-filtering the candidate pool.

3. Moves DMCA Section 1201 rulemaking to the Register alone

Section 6(a)(1)(B)(iv) of the bill amends Section 1201(a)(1) of Title 17, the anti-circumvention rule, by striking "the Librarian of Congress, upon the recommendation of the Register of Copyrights, who shall consult with the Assistant Secretary for Communications and Information of the Department of Commerce" and replacing the structure so the Register of Copyrights sits at the top of the rulemaking process.[1][3]

This is the change EFF flagged as the most consequential. The Section 1201 triennial rulemaking is the only regular process by which users can win narrow exemptions to the DMCA's ban on circumventing technological protection measures. EFF has used the rulemaking repeatedly to win exemptions for security research, repair, preservation, and accessibility.[1] Under current law, the Librarian of Congress is the decider, the Register is the recommender, and the National Telecommunications and Information Administration (NTIA) at Commerce is a co-consultee. The bill collapses that two-officer-plus-NTIA structure into a single Register-led process, with no statutory check from the Librarian.[1][3]

Why This Matters Now

DMCA 1201: the Librarian as a counterweight

The Librarian of Congress is a legislative-branch office, appointed to a 10-year term and structurally insulated from the political cycle. The Register of Copyrights, under current law, is appointed by the Librarian. The triennial Section 1201 rulemaking has, since 2000, given the Librarian the final word on which narrow classes of circumvention are exempt from the DMCA's prohibition. EFF's deeplinks piece puts it bluntly: "H.R. 6028 would move rulemaking authority over 1201 from the Librarian of Congress to the Register of Copyrights, further consolidating power within the Copyright Office itself."[1]

The current 9th Triennial Proceeding is open and accepting comments at the Copyright Office.[8] The 8th Triennial, concluded in 2024, granted new exemptions for security research on consumer devices and for repair of medical device firmware, among others.[9] Those exemptions are written into the Code of Federal Regulations and renewed every three years. If H.R. 6028 becomes law, the next renewal round is decided by a Register whose appointment is a presidential trophy, not by a Librarian with a 10-year statutory term.

AI training data: the lawsuit blast radius

This is the part that hits SOS readers directly. The Copyright Office in 2025 published Part 3 of its "Copyright and Artificial Intelligence" report, titled "Generative AI Training," which concluded that using copyrighted material to train generative AI models "may not" always qualify as fair use under 17 U.S.C. or existing case law.[4][10] Days after the report, on May 10, 2025, the Trump administration fired Register Shira Perlmutter and replaced her with Paul Perkins as acting Register.[4] Perlmutter sued; on September 10, 2025, a divided three-judge panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit ruled 2-1 that she is entitled to continue serving, on the grounds that the Copyright Office is housed in the legislative branch and the President therefore lacks removal authority.[5]

That is the live legal question H.R. 6028 resolves in a different direction. If the Register is a presidentially appointed, Senate-confirmed office, the executive-branch control the D.C. Circuit just rejected in Perlmutter is written directly into Title 17.[3][5] The next AI training data copyright lawsuit (NYT v. OpenAI, Authors Guild v. OpenAI, Getty v. Stability AI, the Anthropic class action that settled for $1.5 billion) that reaches the Copyright Office for an amicus brief, a regulatory filing, or a Section 1201 rulemaking comment is now being read by an office the President appoints and can remove.[1][11]

The Library of Congress as a counterweight

EFF argues the Library of Congress is supposed to be the public-interest counterweight in copyright debates, because the Library's mission is to serve the public, register deposits, and grow the national collection, not to maximize licensing revenue for any one industry.[1] Severing the Copyright Office from the Library removes that structural check. The Library itself, the American Library Association, and library associations have pushed back; the EFF piece links the joint March letter from EFF, Public Knowledge, the Center for Democracy and Technology, and library organizations urging Congress not to fast-track the bill.[1]

What EFF Says (And Why)

EFF's June 10, 2026 deeplinks post by Joe Mullin is the primary source for the structural critique. The argument runs in three parts.[1]

Part 1: The bill is not what it is sold as. The bill's title and section headings describe a technical cleanup, but the substantive Copyright Office changes are not technical. Severing the supervisory relationship, switching the appointment process to a presidential nomination with Senate confirmation, and consolidating Section 1201 rulemaking in the Register are all political changes with predictable political consequences.[1]

Part 2: The Copyright Office has a track record of public-interest failure when it operates without checks. EFF points to two specific episodes. First, the Copyright Office's 2025 AI report on fair use "severely bungled the issue of fair use, prioritizing private licensing market 'solutions' over user rights."[1] Second, the Office supported the Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA) in 2011-2012, one of the most infamous anti-internet proposals in U.S. history, before the SOPA/PIPA protests forced a Congressional retreat.[1] The pattern is a Copyright Office that, when left to its own policy preferences, swings toward maximalist copyright expansion. Concentrating more power in that office, with a presidentially appointed chief, is the opposite direction the public-interest track record supports.[1]

Part 3: No hearings, no record, no public scrutiny. "H.R. 6028 creates a years-long separation of the Copyright Office from the Library of Congress, transfers significant legal authority, and restructures the appointment process for the nation's top copyright official. Changes like that deserve hearings, debate, and public scrutiny. H.R. 6028 got none of that."[1] EFF is calling on the Senate to reject the bill, period.[1]

What the Senate Will Probably Do

GovTrack's prognosis, based on the bill's referral pattern and the absence of any Senate companion, is 21% chance of enactment.[2] For comparison, the average bill introduced in the 119th Congress has about a 3-5% chance of being enacted, so 21% is not nothing; it just means the Senate has a real opportunity to kill this.

The Senate Rules Committee would have jurisdiction over the legislative-branch title. The Senate has its own tradition of treating the Library of Congress as a nonpartisan institution (Carla Hayden's 2016 confirmation was 74-18; the Librarian serves a 10-year term by statute, 2 U.S.C. § 136).[12] Hayden was fired by the Trump administration on May 8, 2025, two days before Perlmutter was fired, and the firing is the subject of a separate pending lawsuit.[13] The Senate's posture on H.R. 6028 is going to be the first public signal of whether the chamber treats the Library/Copyright Office pair as a legislative-branch check or as a presidential patronage pool.

What You Can Do

  1. Submit a public comment on the 9th Triennial Section 1201 Proceeding. The Copyright Office is accepting comments until the deadline (check the 2024 cycle page for the next round's calendar).[8] Every comment is a public record. The comment process is the only place where the public can directly shape the exemption list, and it is the rulemaking the bill is trying to move out of legislative-branch hands.
  2. Tell your two senators to oppose H.R. 6028. EFF's call to action is the Senate kill.[1] Use 5Calls or the EFF's Action Center; both have a one-click template for "Oppose H.R. 6028, the Legislative Branch Agencies Clarification Act." The bill has no Senate companion and no committee movement on the Senate side, which means individual senator objections are the lever.
  3. Track the Perlmutter reinstatement. The D.C. Circuit's September 10, 2025 2-1 ruling reinstated Perlmutter, but the case is not closed.[5] Any new Register appointment, any new amicus filing in an AI training data case, and any new Section 1201 rulemaking is downstream of the resolution of who is the Register when H.R. 6028 reaches the President's desk.
  4. Read the bill text yourself. The engrossed House text is 54 pages on GovInfo.[3] Section 6 is the part to read. The rest of the bill is the name earning its keep.
  5. Cross-check the standing AI training data lawsuits piece. Our existing explainer on the AI training data copyright lawsuits tracks NYT v. OpenAI, Authors Guild, Getty, and the Anthropic settlement. The list of defendants, the procedural postures, and the appellate calendars are the parts that matter over the next 12-18 months.[11]

References

  1. Joe Mullin, "Congress Just Rushed Through a Disastrous Copyright Office Overhaul," Electronic Frontier Foundation, June 10, 2026. https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2026/06/congress-just-rushed-through-disastrous-copyright-office-overhaul
  2. "H.R. 6028 (119th): Legislative Branch Agencies Clarification Act," GovTrack.us, last updated June 8, 2026. https://www.govtrack.us/congress/bills/119/hr6028
  3. "H.R. 6028, Legislative Branch Agencies Clarification Act, Engrossed in House (EH)," 119th Congress, 2d Session, U.S. Government Publishing Office via GovInfo, June 8, 2026. https://www.govinfo.gov/content/pkg/BILLS-119hr6028eh/html/BILLS-119hr6028eh.htm
  4. "Shira Perlmutter," Wikipedia, page last edited May 9, 2026. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shira_Perlmutter
  5. "United States Copyright Office," Wikipedia (covering September 10, 2025 D.C. Circuit ruling on Perlmutter's reinstatement). https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_Copyright_Office
  6. "Cosponsors of H.R. 6028," GovTrack.us (Carey, Miller, Loudermilk, Murphy). https://www.govtrack.us/congress/bills/119/hr6028/cosponsors
  7. "H.R. 6028 would fundamentally change the U.S. Copyright Office," Hacker News, 231 points, 81 comments, June 10-13, 2026. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48484496
  8. "Ninth Triennial Section 1201 Proceeding, 2024 Cycle," U.S. Copyright Office. https://www.copyright.gov/1201/2024/
  9. "Rulemaking Proceedings Under Section 1201 of Title 17," U.S. Copyright Office (landing page covering the 8th Triennial, 2021 cycle, and earlier). https://www.copyright.gov/1201/
  10. U.S. Copyright Office, "Copyright and Artificial Intelligence, Part 3: Generative AI Training Report, Pre-Publication Version" (May 2025). https://www.copyright.gov/ai/Copyright-and-Artificial-Intelligence-Part-3-Generative-AI-Training-Report-Pre-Publication-Version.pdf
  11. State of Surveillance, "AI Training Data: Your Content Builds Someone Else's Fortune" (standing explainer, January 10, 2026). stateofsurveillance.org/news/ai-training-data-copyright-scraping-lawsuits-2026
  12. "Carla Hayden," Wikipedia, covering 74-18 confirmation (July 13, 2016), 10-year statutory term under 2 U.S.C. § 136, and the May 8, 2025 firing and pending litigation. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carla_Hayden
  13. "Librarian of Congress," Wikipedia (covering the office's 10-year term structure, the Library's role as a legislative-branch institution, and the May 2025 removal context). https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Librarian_of_Congress
  14. "DMCA Rulemaking," Electronic Frontier Foundation issues page (24 years of triennial Section 1201 work, 2000-2024). https://www.eff.org/issues/dmca-rulemaking