The American Property Casualty Insurance Association has applauded House consideration of H.R. 7128, the TRIA Program Reauthorization Act, which would extend the Terrorism Risk Insurance Program for seven years and preserve a backstop that commercial insurers and policyholders have relied on for more than two decades.
The bill, introduced by Representative Mike Flood (R-NE) with Representative Andrew Garbarino (R-NY) as original cosponsor, would extend the program's authorization from its current 2027 expiration to 2034. The House Financial Services Committee voted 51-2 in January to advance the legislation to the full House floor, a margin reflecting the bipartisan support TRIA reauthorizations have historically attracted since the program's creation following the September 11 attacks.
"APCIA applauds House consideration of H.R. 7128, the TRIA Program Reauthorization Act, which would extend the Terrorism Risk Insurance Program for seven years and preserve the program's vital economic protection against acts of terrorism that so many companies rely on," said Sam Whitfield, APCIA's senior vice president of federal government relations and political engagement. "We appreciate that the House is acting early in the process. By moving now, it helps prevent the uncertainty and confusion that would occur if Congress waited until 2027."
TRIA was first enacted in 2002 after insurers and reinsurers largely withdrew from the terrorism risk market following the 9/11 attacks, which generated more than $40 billion in insured losses. The program has since been reauthorized four times, in 2005, 2007, 2015 and 2019, each time with strong bipartisan backing.
The current scale of the market underscores why insurers view continuity as critical. Total premiums for all TRIP-eligible lines of insurance reached $314.1 billion in 2024, and Treasury estimated insurers have collected $68.3 billion in terrorism insurance premiums since the program's inception in 2003 through 2023. Take-up rates for terrorism coverage range from roughly 60% to nearly 80% depending on the metric used, with between 30% and 35% of coverage typically embedded in broader policies at no separate charge. Some 74% of stand-alone terrorism policies written in 2024 were TRIP-eligible, and Treasury has noted that whether private coverage would remain available and affordable without TRIA is uncertain.
The program's mechanics matter directly to insurer balance sheets. A terrorist act must cause $5 million in insured losses to be certified for TRIA coverage, aggregate insured losses must reach $200 million in a year before federal coverage begins, and an individual insurer must meet a deductible equal to 20% of its annual premiums before government reimbursement kicks in. Once those thresholds are met, the federal government covers 80% of insured losses.
H.R. 7128 would raise the qualifying loss threshold from $5 million to $10 million beginning in 2029 and codify a 90-day deadline for Treasury to issue certification determinations - changes aimed at improving claims certainty and transparency for insurers managing potential exposures.
The reauthorization push coincides with Treasury's own statutory review of the program. The Federal Insurance Office must submit a 2026 Effectiveness Report to Congress by June 30, 2026, and has been soliciting industry comment on the program's impact, including its effect on workers' compensation insurers. The Senate is moving in parallel, with Senator David McCormick (R-PA) introducing companion bill S. 4395 on April 27, 2026, ahead of TRIA's scheduled December 31, 2027 expiration.
Whitfield thanked the lawmakers leading the effort. "We thank Chairman Hill, Ranking Member Waters, Subcommittee Chair Flood, Subcommittee Ranking Member Cleaver, and Congressman Garbarino for their leadership on this critical legislation," he said. "APCIA urges the House to pass H.R. 7128, and to work with the Senate so that TRIA reauthorization can reach the president's desk for signature before the end of the year."
Industry advocates view the combination of committee-level bipartisan support, a parallel Senate bill and Treasury's pending effectiveness review as favorable conditions for the reauthorization to clear Congress ahead of the 2027 deadline, though the timeline ultimately depends on the broader legislative calendar in both chambers.
The reauthorization debate also carries relevance for insurers operating across North America, since Canada has no government-backed terrorism reinsurance program comparable to TRIA - a gap that becomes more pronounced as the US moves toward locking in its own backstop through 2034.
The Property and Casualty Insurance Compensation Corporation has flagged the absence of such a backstop as a structural gap in Canada's catastrophe risk framework. Insurance Bureau of Canada data shows that severe weather and catastrophe-related losses, rather than terrorism, have dominated Canadian insurer attention in recent years, leaving terrorism risk comparatively under-addressed at the policy level.
That gap is compounded by a design mismatch: Canadian commercial terrorism wordings have historically been adapted from US-drafted language built around the TRIA framework, even though Canada's risk landscape and lack of a federal backstop arguably call for a different approach to policy design. Tight definitions of what constitutes a terrorism-triggering incident, carried over from that US-influenced drafting, can leave coverage gaps for events that don't clearly fit traditional definitions of religiously, politically or ideologically motivated attacks - active shooter incidents or other "malicious attack" scenarios being the clearest examples.
Canada's continued absence from the list of countries with a formal government-backed terrorism pool is notable relative to peer G7 economies. The UK's Pool Re and France's GAREAT both operate public-private terrorism risk-sharing mechanisms broadly comparable in function to TRIA, leaving Canada as something of an outlier among its G7 peers on this specific risk-sharing structure.
