U.S. President Donald Trump points his finger as he answers questions from the media after signing an executive order establishing the President's Military Spouse Commission, August 3, 2026. REUTERS/Evelyn Hockstein
Just two weeks into President Donald Trump's second term, then-Attorney General Pam Bondi wrote a series of memos that made new rules at the Justice Department, The New Republic's Casey Michel explained. They aren't laws, and they aren't official regulations; they only change the DOJ's priorities, eliminating key anti-bribery and anti-kleptocracy rules built over decades, some of which were established before Trump was born in 1946.
First is the Foreign Agents Registration Act (FARA), which is still a law passed by Congress, but Bondi "announced that it would focus solely on lobbying crimes that were ‘similar to more traditional espionage,'" the report explained.
"For decades, FARA was itself a backwater, largely unenforced and almost entirely overlooked," wrote Michel. "That disuse allowed the foreign lobbying industry — which now comprised not just traditional lobbying shops, but also PR professionals, consultancies, white-shoe law firms, think tanks, and many more — to blossom into a multibillion-dollar behemoth, flipping into the go-to tool for foreign dictatorships looking to tilt American policy however they wanted."
When Bondi came in, enforcement got even more lax. While the laws were on the books, the DOJ's focus on crimes “similar to more traditional espionage" confounded critics. "FARA has nothing to do with spying," the report explained. Under Bondi, FARA was effectively dead.
Then came another decision by Bondi: she cut the FBI’s Foreign Influence Task Force. Ironically, it was created in Trump's first term and quickly became the "U.S.’s leading tool for tracking and tracing foreign influence campaigns around the country, dedicated to dismantling infiltration campaigns out of places like Russia, China, Iran, Venezuela and more."
Then came the elimination of the Kleptocracy Asset Recovery Initiative, which started in 2010. It was part of an effort to stop dirty money networks funneling it into the U.S. The program wasn't hugely successful, only bringing in millions "pilfered around the world," instead of billions. Countries like Nigeria, Malaysia and Uzbekistan all returned looted dirty money from abroad.
The other initiative eliminated was KleptoCapture, a program that grew out of sanctions against Russia for the invasion of Ukraine. While Russian oligarchs had assets frozen or seized in other countries, the U.S. would do the same for what was located in the country if the wealth came from "illicit" means, including ties to the Kremlin.
All of these rules were eliminated "in a single day," effectively "kneecapp[ing] its most successful and most prominent counter-kleptocracy tools."
However, it was only the beginning. Trump has since eliminated enforcement of the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act (FCPA) with an executive order.
Trump claimed that the law needed to go to ensure “American economic competitiveness” and allow American companies to engage in “routine business practices in other nations." Michel called it nothing more than "a handy euphemism for bribery."
It put "foreign corruption ... back on the table. Kleptocratic regimes and crooked American businessmen around the world rejoiced, knowing they wouldn’t have to worry about pesky prosecutions anymore," the report said. "One of the greatest post-Watergate reforms was now dead, for all to see."
In 2021, the first-ever shell company registry was crafted, making it impossible for oligarchs to use corporations to hide ownership. But by March 2025, Trump eliminated it too.
The new program has been Trump's so-called "golden visa," which allows people to buy citizenship. "Kleptocrats couldn’t have asked for more," Michel closed.