Committee advances bill restricting commercial sharing of state records for immigration enforcement

The Judicial Proceedings Committee voted to report Senate Bill 977 favorably as amended on March 17, advancing an amended measure that places new limits on commercial sharing of state-created records and expands existing prohibitions on sharing state information for immigration-enforcement purposes.

Committee staff described the amendment in the packet (identified in committee as amendment 733928/1). The amended bill has three principal parts: a provision in the Business Regulations Article that generally prohibits persons in possession of a covered record (a record created by the state that contains personal information) from sharing that record in exchange for anything of value or for resale; a narrower prohibition that bars entities that obtained a covered record in exchange for value from sharing it for immigration-enforcement purposes…