US Copyright Office
The federal agency that registers copyrights in the United States and advises Congress and the courts on copyright policy.
The Copyright Office sits inside the Library of Congress. It registers works, keeps the records courts rely on, and publishes reports that judges and lawmakers treat as expert guidance, though those reports carry no binding legal force.
It landed in the middle of the AI argument in 2025 with a report concluding that training models on huge amounts of copyrighted work does not automatically qualify as fair use. Register of Copyrights Shira Perlmutter was dismissed shortly afterwards and is contesting the dismissal. In 2026 the Department of Justice filed a brief taking the opposite position and arguing the report misread the case law.