Following passage through the House Judiciary Committee in January, the United States House of Representatives yesterday passed H.R. 2853, the Combatting Organized Retail Crime Act (CORCA).
The legislation was introduced in April 2025 by Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa), who also serves as Senate Judiciary Committee chairman, and Rep. David Joyce (R-Ohio). It has bipartisan support and aims to strengthen the nation’s response to organized retail crime involving the theft of goods for resale through physical and online marketplaces.
Key provisions of the legislation, as noted by Rep. Joyce’s office, include:
- enhancing coordination among federal, state, and local law enforcement agencies to combat organized retail and supply chain crime;
- improve safe information-sharing with retailers, manufacturers, and transportation providers to identify and respond to emerging threats;
- strengthen legal tools to disrupt criminal financing, including clarifying that gift cards may be treated as monetary instruments for money-laundering investigations;
- enable prosecutors to more efficiently target large-scale criminal enterprises by aggregating theft values tied to organized schemes;
- improve transparency by reporting on national trends in organized retail and supply chain crime; and
- establish an Organized Retail and Supply Chain Crime Coordination Center within Homeland Security Investigations (HIS) at the Department of Homeland Security, which would enable increased collaboration between federal, state, and local law enforcement agencies, along with retail crime associations and subject-matter experts, to develop a cohesive strategy to combat these crimes and share valuable resources
“Organized retail crime is an issue that affects everyone. Whether you are a business owner, truck driver, or the average consumer, these criminal enterprises are hurting your wallet and putting communities in danger,” said Joyce. “The Combating Organized Retail Crime Act takes a targeted approach to apprehending these criminal networks by establishing an Organized Retail and Supply Chain Crime Coordination Center at the Department of Homeland Security and giving law enforcement the tools they need to do their job and protect our communities. I want to thank my colleagues in the House for supporting this legislation, and I urge the Senate to pass it swiftly.”
Citing examples of organized retail crime, Rep. Joyce’s office explained that organized retail crime goes far beyond isolated theft and increasingly involves sophisticated multi-state, and sometimes international criminal networks stealing large volumes of goods, engaging in cargo theft, and laundering proceeds through financial instruments like gift cards. It added that criminal enterprises are putting retail employees, warehouse workers, truck drivers, rail workers, and customers at risk and also disrupting access to goods.
CORCA’s passage through the House was positively received by various industry groups.
“The House’s passage of the Combating Organized Retail Crime Act (CORCA) is a meaningful step forward in addressing the growing threat of cargo theft across our supply chain,” said Chris Burroughs, President & CEO of the Transportation Intermediaries Association (TIA). “For TIA members, cargo theft is not an abstract issue—it’s a daily operational and financial risk that ultimately impacts shippers, carriers, and consumers alike. By strengthening coordination between federal, state, and local law enforcement and prioritizing organized theft networks, CORCA helps bring much-needed focus and resources to this issue. TIA strongly supports this legislation and looks forward to continued collaboration with policymakers to protect the integrity and security of freight movement across the country.”
National Retail Federation Executive Vice President of Government Relations David French said that organized retail crime is one of the most urgent challenges facing retailers large and small in the communities they serve, adding that NRF has long advocated for federal legislation that strengthens coordination among federal, state and local law enforcement agencies to combat these criminal networks and better protect retail employees and customers nationwide.
French’s colleague, Jonathan Gold recently told LM that cargo theft has been around for a while and is part of a bigger trend in organized retail crime, in the form of more coordinated efforts to steal products, sell them for profit, and use those profits for more nefarious crimes, which have increased in stores and warehouses, while attacking the supply chain and financial networks.
Gold added that CORCA marks a good first step in addressing these issues, with 200 bipartisan co-sponsors in the House and close to 45 bipartisan co-sponsors in the Senate.
“[These crimes] don’t just happen in one jurisdiction,” he said. “They’re happening across city lines, county lines, state lines and international boundaries. What we need is the center to help put it all together, show the big picture, and help provide resources for state and local law enforcement to go after these bigger fish and go after the bigger criminals. A lot of this is being directed by organizations outside the United States, like transnational criminal organizations, so hopefully this effort allows us to put more money and effort into going after those organized rings, because we’re seeing not just a rise in theft of product, but a rise in violence tied to some of these activities as well, which puts our associates at risk, our customers at risk, and our partners at risk.
And for retailers, it’s not only just working internally on some of these issues, it is also working closely with their transportation providers, especially on kind of the cargo theft side, and making sure they’re using legitimate drivers and legitimate companies for transportation purposes. There’s a lot of things like freight fraud and double brokering and things like that that need to be addressed.”
The American Trucking Associations (ATA) also expressed support for CORCA advancing through the House, with ATA President & CEO Chris Spear calling it a pivotal moment in ATA’s fight to protect drivers, freight, and the integrity of the supply chain.
“Cargo thieves are stealing $18 million every day from the trucking industry, and motor carriers and consumers are paying the price,” said Spear. “CORCA will give our industry and law enforcement the tools we need to fight back against highly organized, technologically advanced cargo theft rings, which are often orchestrated by transnational criminal groups.”
As previously reported by LM, late last month, a group of freight, retail, and manufacturing stakeholders called on Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche and the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) to take action, regarding the escalation of cargo theft and organized retail crime (ORC), through congressionally mandated measures.
In a letter to Blanche, the group of 24 stakeholders—including the ATA, Association of American Railroads, Intermodal Association of North America, NRF, DHL, and UPS—emphasized the “urgent need” for DOJ to fully implement funding provided by Congress in the FY2026 Commerce, Justice, Science, and Related Agencies (CJS) Appropriations Act. The funding would support the establishment of dedicated special prosecutors focused on combating supply chain fraud, organized retail crime, and related financial schemes such as gift card fraud.
“Cargo theft and ORC have escalated dramatically in recent years, affecting freight rail, trucking, retailers, and the broader U.S. economy,” the letter stated. “These crimes are not isolated or opportunistic, but are increasingly carried out by organized, sophisticated criminal networks operating across state and national borders. Through the resale of stolen goods and related monetization schemes, these criminal rings often engage in broader illicit activities, including drug trafficking, money laundering, and terrorism.
The stakeholders outlined several ways the funding could help curb cargo theft and ORC activity:
- develop specialized expertise in complex cargo theft, ORC, and related financial fraud cases;
- strengthen coordination with federal partners such as Homeland Security Investigations (HSI), as well as state and local law enforcement and prosecutors;
- establish a prosecutorial model that can be replicated nationwide; and
- deter increasingly sophisticated criminal enterprises exploiting the supply chain
