Project 2025 Tracker / What’s done, what’s next

7. Intelligence Community · Notable · Needs Congress

Close loopholes in the Foreign Agents Registration Act

Not started

217 7. Intelligence Community

“In addition, to combat China’s economic espionage, authorities and loopholes in the Foreign Agents Registration Act (FARA) will have to be examined and addressed in conjunction with the Attorney General.”

What has happened

  1. Not started

    The Attorney General moved the other way. The memorandum of 2025-02-05 on charging, plea negotiations and sentencing provides that "the Foreign Influence Task Force shall be disbanded", that "Recourse to criminal charges under the Foreign Agents Registration Act (FARA) and 18 U.S.C. § 951 shall be limited to instances of alleged conduct similar to more traditional espionage by foreign government actors", and that the FARA Unit "shall focus on civil enforcement, regulatory initiatives, and public guidance". FARA's authorities were narrowed in practice rather than examined and its loopholes closed. Congress has not acted either: the only FARA bill of the 119th Congress, H.R. 10166 (social-media influencers), was referred to House Judiciary on 2026-08-27.

Research log

What was searched, and what didn’t count as evidence

Research notes

  • Memorandum read in full from https://www.justice.gov/ag/media/1388541/dl; the National Security Division passage is under “Shifting Resources in the National Security Division”. This is one of the fourteen Attorney General memoranda of 2025-02-05.
  • The Department’s only in-window FARA rulemaking activity is Paperwork Reduction Act renewals of the registration forms NSD-1 to NSD-6 (2026-04-10 and 2026-06-11, twelve notices). Their abstracts are boilerplate information-collection submissions to OMB, not substantive amendments; not Evidence on this ask.
  • This ask needs an act of Congress; the executive half of the Quote (“in conjunction with the Attorney General”) is what the memorandum answers, and it answers it in the negative.
  • This ask is also covered by a single negative search of the asks on pp. 215-217 that need an act of Congress.
Action
other
Object
Foreign Agents Registration Act (FARA)
ID
576