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Expanding Access to Capital for Rural Job Creators Act

To amend the Securities Exchange Act of 1934 to expand access to capital for rural-area small businesses, and for other purposes.

Introduced Feb 13, 2025

Latest action (Feb 13, 2025) Read twice and referred to the Committee on Banking, Housing, and Urban Affairs.

Referred to
Banking, Housing, and Urban Affairs Committee
Policy area
Finance and Financial Sector
Issues
Economy & Taxes

Summary

This bill would amend the Securities Exchange Act of 1934 to expand access to capital for rural-area small businesses. It adds rural-area small businesses to existing Securities and Exchange Commission provisions that already apply to women-owned small businesses, giving them the same regulatory treatment. The amendments add rural businesses to two separate regulatory provisions in Section 4(j) of the Act. The bill aims to improve access to capital markets for small businesses located in rural areas by treating them similarly to other designated business categories.

AI-generated plain-language summary of the bill text — neutral, and may be imperfect. See the full text below for the exact wording.

Sponsor (1)
5 cosponsors

Actions (2)
  1. Feb 13, 2025 Read twice and referred to the Committee on Banking, Housing, and Urban Affairs. · senate
  2. Feb 13, 2025 Introduced in Senate

Similar bills (6)

Bills with similar text or summary — includes reintroductions across Congresses. Ranked by semantic similarity of the bill text (computed locally); a neutral discovery aid, not a claim the bills are duplicates.

  • HR 3673 — Small Business Investor Capital Access Act · Introduced Sep 8, 2025 · Cong. 119 71%
  • HR 4565 — Startup Capital Modernization Act of 2014 · Introduced May 22, 2014 · Cong. 113 68%
  • HR 4697 — Small-Cap Access to Capital Act · Introduced Jun 11, 2014 · Cong. 113 66%
  • HR 1246 — Investing in Rural America Act of 2025 · Introduced Mar 20, 2025 · Cong. 119 66%
  • S 1603 — Preserving Rural Housing Investments Act · Introduced May 6, 2025 · Cong. 119 65%
  • S 3967 — Improving Crowdfunding Opportunities Act · Introduced Dec 13, 2022 · Cong. 117 62%

Full text

IN THE SENATE OF THE UNITED STATES

February 13, 2025

Mr. Kennedy (for himself, Mrs. Capito, Mr. Peters, and Mr. Warnock) introduced the following bill; which was read twice and referred to the Committee on Banking, Housing, and Urban Affairs

A BILL

To amend the Securities Exchange Act of 1934 to expand access to capital for rural-area small businesses, and for other purposes.

Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of the United States of America in Congress assembled,

SECTION 1. SHORT TITLE.

This Act may be cited as the “Expanding Access to Capital for Rural Job Creators Act”.

SEC. 2. ACCESS TO CAPITAL FOR RURAL-AREA SMALL BUSINESSES.

Section 4(j) of the Securities Exchange Act of 1934 (15 U.S.C. 78d(j)) is amended—

(1) in paragraph (4)(C), by inserting “rural-area small businesses,” after “women-owned small businesses,”; and

(2) in paragraph (6)(B)(iii), by inserting “rural-area small businesses,” after “women-owned small businesses,”. <all>

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