H.R. 6723: Bring Our Heroes Home Act

HR6723 would create a new "Missing Armed Forces and Civilian Personnel Records Collection" at the National Archives and set up a 5-member review board, appointed by the President and confirmed by the Senate, to push records into public view. The records covered are broad: they include files on missing service members, missing civilian personnel, and even people whose status later changed to "missing and presumed dead." The collection reaches from December 7, 1941, through the date the bill becomes law.

The bill's biggest impact is its timeline. Once a quorum of the board exists, government offices have 270 days to identify and review records, and record transfers must begin within 270 days and finish within 1 year. The Archivist also has 270 days after the board reaches a quorum to identify classified records. Then comes the long-stop deadline: all records must be disclosed in full 10 years after the board quorum, unless the President personally certifies that continued postponement is necessary. Even then, postponed records have to be re-reviewed at least every 5 years after the board shuts down.

The bill tries to stop agencies from slow-walking or reshaping the record. Agencies must certify under penalty of perjury that they conducted a thorough search. Records cannot be destroyed, altered, or mutilated. And if a record was already made public before enactment, it cannot later be withheld, redacted, or reclassified. For older records, the secrecy bar gets even higher: if a record was created more than 25 years before review, the government needs "clear and convincing evidence" of harm to keep it back.

There are still carveouts. The Defense POW/MIA Accounting Agency and Military or State Service Casualty Offices do not have to turn over documents tied to active investigations or active family support cases. The bill also preserves some legal limits by giving priority over other laws except Section 6103 of the Internal Revenue Code of 1986, which protects tax return information, and deeds governing donated records. It also signals a foreign-policy push, saying the Secretary of State should seek relevant records from the governments of the Russian Federation, China, and North Korea.