Congress·In Progress·H.R. 7632

SHADOW Act

House Bill Would Create State Dept. Coordinator to Counter Chinese, Russian Hybrid Warfare

Feb 20·View on Congress.gov·Read full text

Next up: A house committee

The SHADOW Act is currently in the House Committee on Foreign Affairs. Although the committee voted to move the bill forward in March 2026, there has been no further action for three months. The bill is now waiting for the committee to take the next steps in the legislative process.

Legislative Progress

House

Senate

President

Law

Key Points

This bill creates a new leadership role at the State Department to track "hybrid warfare." This includes sneaky tactics like cyber-attacks, spreading fake news, and using economic pressure to weaken the U.S. or its allies.
The new coordinator will work with international partners like NATO, Japan, and Australia to share information. Together, they will try to protect important systems like power plants, phone networks, and underwater internet cables from being sabotaged.
The State Department would be required to create a public list of Chinese companies that are helping Russia build up its military. This list would include recommendations for sanctions or trade bans against those specific businesses.
The policy aims to address modern threats that don't always involve traditional soldiers. This includes things like hacking, political intimidation, and the "weaponization" of migration to put pressure on other countries.

National Security Foreign Policy

Impact Analysis

Personal Impact

Scores run from -100 (strongly harmful) to +100 (strongly beneficial) for each group, combining impact, certainty, scope, and duration ratings of 1-5. How impact scoring works

The bill requires the Secretary of State to designate an existing senior official as the Coordinator for Hybrid Warfare Accountability within 30 days. This creates new responsibilities and reporting requirements for State Department staff involved in hybrid warfare assessment, interagency coordination, and allied engagement, but does not change pay, benefits, or workforce size.

ImpactCertaintyScopeDurationSentiment

Broader Impacts

DomainScoreShort-termLong-termReversibilityConfidence

Score

Scores: -5 (harmful) to +5 (beneficial)Short-term: 0-2 yearsLong-term: 10-30 years

Milestones

3 milestones4 actions

Mar 26, 2026House

Ordered to be Reported in the Nature of a Substitute by the Yeas and Nays: 46 - 0.

The committee approved this bill and is sending it to the full chamber for a vote. This is a significant step — most bills never get this far.

Mar 26, 2026House

Committee Consideration and Mark-up Session Held

Feb 20, 2026House

Referred to the House Committee on Foreign Affairs.

Feb 20, 2026

Introduced in House

The bill was officially filed and given a number. It now enters the legislative queue.

Related News

2 articles

GLOBSEC·Jan 13

How Russia's Hybrid Warfare Will Escalate in 2026 and What Europe Must Do

Analysis of Russia's hybrid toolkit for 2026 predicts intensified sabotage against logistics nodes and critical civilian infrastructure. The report emphasizes the use of dual-use ships and third-country flags to damage undersea fiber cables and bypass Western sanctions infrastructure.

Center

Latvian Public Broadcasting·Feb 22

Europe in the shadow of hybrid war: What does Russian systemic pressure look like?

Security risks generated by Russia for Europe are increasing significantly as of early 2026. Experts assess that Russia is prepared for a prolonged confrontation, using informational operations and cyberattacks as a coherent pressure mechanism to fracture Western political will.

Center

No votes or related bills recorded for this bill yet.