However we also have a need for a robust criminal legal approach to address the problem of transnational repression that can better synthesize the crime and its penalties. A comprehensive definition introduced through legislation could allow prosecutors to target perpetrators more directly. For example, in the criminal indictment against the perpetrators who attempted to kidnap Iranian-American dissident Masih Alinejad, there was a reliance on charges such as conspiracy to commit bank and wire fraud and conspiracy to commit money laundering. While the first paragraph of that indictment identified the problem as one of transnational repression, the lack of a specific provision in the US Code meant the defendants needed to face a range of other charges. In that indictment, the four Iran-based defendants were charged in federal court because they hired a private investigative firm based in the United States and used the US financial system, which is prohibited to agents of the Islamic Republic. But many other acts leading up to the kidnapping plot encompassed transnational repression. For example, Islamic Republic of Iran officials pressured Ms. Alinejad’s family with offers of payment to lure Ms. Alinejad to meet them in a third country, where she could be more easily abducted. They also imprisoned her brother on unfounded national-security charges, simply to exert pressure on Ms. Alinejad. These are all acts of transnational repression intended to target a US person, but they do not fall neatly within existing US criminal law. A survey of DOJ indictments against PRC actors engaging in transnational repression reveals a similar pattern of charging. A new legal definition could specifically outline what types of acts will constitute harassment and persecution—including crimes like murder, torture, and kidnapping, as well as cyberattacks and the spread of disinformation. As lawmakers consider legislative proposals to criminalize transnational repression, jurisdictional reach should also be a key consideration. Title 18 of the US Code already provides jurisdiction outside the United States over a broad range of international crimes such as torture, genocide, war crimes, recruitment of child soldiers, trafficking, piracy, and terrorism. But jurisdiction must be expansive enough to protect victims. If a bill only allows for the exercise of extraterritorial jurisdiction when the perpetrator or victim is a US national, it would leave an accountability gap. For example, prosecutors would be hindered from bringing a case if foreign family members of a political dissident are being targeted by a foreign state and that political dissident has recently arrived in the United States as a refugee or asylum seeker. Short of a federal criminal statute specifically addressing transnational repression, other proposals that might help enforce accountability include an extraterritorial federal criminal statute for extrajudicial killings, which could provide accountability if a US-based dissident’s family members are killed. Then there are civil litigation tools that could provide remedies for transnational repression.