American seniors lost $7.75 billion to foreign cyber criminals last year – a 59% surge in a single year.
Now a Republican senator wants to arm Trump with a constitutional power that hasn't been used since the Civil War.
What Mike Lee just handed Trump is something that's been locked in the Constitution for nearly 240 years – and nobody in Washington has touched it.
FBI Report: Elder Fraud and Senior Scams Hit Record $7.75 Billion in 2025
Foreign hackers know exactly who to target.
Criminals linked to China, cartels, and rogue regimes spent 2025 running ransomware attacks, crypto scams, and investment fraud against American seniors – and they cleaned up.
The FBI's 2025 Internet Crime Report confirmed the full damage: $20.9 billion in total cybercrime losses, a 26% spike from the prior year.
Seniors 60 and older filed over 201,000 complaints – and lost $7.75 billion, nearly 40% of all reported losses, despite being a fraction of the total population.
The average senior victim lost $38,500.
Twelve thousand four hundred of them lost more than $100,000 each.
Thirty-eight of them were referred to suicide intervention specialists after they were notified they'd been scammed.
Washington's answer has been task forces, tip lines, and press releases.
Americans lost $20.9 billion to cybercrime in 2025 – and the FBI's recovery unit clawed back just $679 million.
Lee has a different idea.
Letters of Marque: The Constitutional Weapon That Helped America Win the Revolution
Article I, Section 8 of the Constitution explicitly grants Congress the power to issue Letters of Marque and Reprisal.
The Founders built it in for a reason – they used it.
By late 1775, Massachusetts was already commissioning privateers, and the Continental Congress followed the next spring.
Nearly 800 American privateers sailed under those commissions – privately funded, government-authorized fighters who raided British shipping, seized assets, and split the proceeds with the new republic.
They helped win the war.
The practice held through the War of 1812, when over 500 private vessels operated under letters of marque while the US Navy was still barely operational.
Congress last authorized the president to issue those instruments during the Civil War – and Lincoln never pulled the trigger.
Nobody has touched the power since.
Senator Mike Lee just dusted it off.
His Cyber Letters of Marque and Reprisal Act authorizes President Trump to commission American digital privateers – private hackers operating under the president's authority – to attack the cyber infrastructure of cartels, criminal organizations, and foreign adversaries targeting American citizens and institutions.
They can seize stolen assets and disrupt enemy operations.
Recovered funds are split between the federal government and the privateer who ran the operation.
"This is the ultimate in white hat hacking: stealing from America's enemies at the direction of the President, and splitting the profits with the federal government," Lee told the Daily Caller.
Rep. Tim Burchett of Tennessee introduced the House version of the bill.
"Widespread cybercrime has become an existential threat to our national security," Burchett said.
"Allowing private operators to aid the federal government in combatting these crimes will strengthen our ability to defend the United States against terrorism."
Privateers must post a security bond before operating and are prohibited from targeting anyone outside designated threats.
Up to 15% of recovered assets fund additional bounty programs – giving American operators a direct financial stake in taking the enemy's money back.
Lee isn't proposing another tip line or task force – he's proposing government-authorized, profit-incentivized warfare against the criminal networks stealing from American grandparents.
China Hackers and Ransomware Gangs Have Counted on a Gap American Law Can't Close
The Left will scream about this.
They'll call it "unregulated" and "dangerous" and demand more studies while the foreign syndicates keep looting.
China-linked hackers, Russian ransomware gangs, and cartel-connected fraud networks operate from jurisdictions where American law enforcement can't reach them.
They count on that gap.
They've built entire criminal industries on top of it.
Lee's bill closes that gap the only way that actually works – by making it profitable to go after them.
The Founders understood something modern Washington forgot: when the government can't get there, commission someone who can and give them a stake in the outcome.
That model helped beat the British Empire with a navy that barely existed.
It can work against the cyber gangs cleaning out the retirement accounts of American seniors today.
The constitutional authority never expired.
Congress just has to use it.
Sources:
- Rebeka Zeljko, "EXCLUSIVE: Trump Could Hire Digital 'Privateers' To Combat Cyber Crime Thanks To Mike Lee's New Bill," The Daily Caller, July 15, 2026.
- "Lee Bill Authorizes American Hackers to Fight Foreign Cyberattacks," Office of Senator Mike Lee, July 15, 2026.
- FBI Internet Crime Complaint Center, 2025 Internet Crime Report, April 2026.
- Congressional Research Service, "Letters of Marque and Reprisal (Part 2): Drafting History and U.S. Practice," Congress.gov, February 26, 2025.
