Foreign Agent Registration Amendment Proposed

A bipartisan group of lawmakers led by Chairman Mike Gallagher (R-WI) and Ranking Member Raja Krishnamoorthi of the Select Committee on the Chinese Communist Party introduced legislation aimed at closing a loophole in the Foreign Agents Registration Act of 1938 (FARA) that has allowed individuals to evade disclosure requirements by terminating their status as foreign agents before they are compelled to register.

Last year, a DC district judge ruled that a suspected foreign agent, who ceased lobbying on behalf of the Chinese government before legal proceedings began, could not be held liable for failing to register under FARA. The new legislation aims to prevent such instances in the future.

This legislation, named the "Retroactive Foreign Agents Registration Act," seeks to amend the Foreign Agents Registration Act (FARA) of 1938. The primary aim of the amendments is to clarify the obligation of individuals who previously served as agents for foreign principals to retroactively register as foreign agents for the activities they carried out on behalf of these principals.

Key provisions of the proposed legislation include:

1. The clarification of obligations to retroactively register as agents of foreign principals. This involves amending the wording in section 2(a) of FARA, replacing "for the period" with "covering the period". The change applies to any individual who served as an agent of a foreign principal under FARA at any time before, on, or after the date of this new Act's enactment.

2. Permitting orders that require compliance with the Act to be applied retroactively. The legislation amends section 8(f) of FARA to give the Attorney General the ability to require a person to comply with the Act or any regulation under the Act, even after their service as a foreign agent has ended. This amendment also applies to anyone who served as an agent of a foreign principal under FARA at any time before, on, or after the enactment date of the new Act.