President Donald Trump has spent years warning Americans that our institutions have been weaponized against ordinary citizens and political opponents. Congress has investigated it. Americans have watched it unfold. But there is one part of that system that still operates almost entirely in the shadows.Lawsuits are targeting American energy development and high-tech manufacturing capacity, but no one knows who is really paying for many of them — and that should alarm every American.Americans should know whether lawsuits targeting pipelines, energy development, border security, defense contractors, infrastructure projects, or major employers are being financed by foreign investors, ideological billionaires, or activist organizations with political agendas.
Foreign adversaries increasingly wage economic warfare instead of conventional warfare. China, Russia, and other strategic competitors understand that slowing American energy production, manufacturing, technology, and infrastructure can often be accomplished through endless litigation just as effectively as through regulation. It could cost the U.S. economy as much as $54 billion in lost output including more than 450,000 lost jobs, according a December 2025 report on Citizens Against Lawsuit Abuse.Congress has already recognized the danger. The Protecting Our Courts from Foreign Manipulation Act, H.R. 2675, would prohibit or require disclosure of certain foreign-backed litigation funding arrangements. The Litigation Transparency Act, H.R. 1109, would require parties in federal civil cases to disclose when outside financiers have a financial stake in litigation.Transparency won’t determine who wins those cases — but it will allow judges, litigants, policymakers, and the public to understand who has a financial or political stake in the outcome.The America First movement has always been about restoring sovereignty, rebuilding American manufacturing, securing our borders, unleashing domestic energy production, and putting American workers ahead of foreign interests. Yet each of those priorities has repeatedly been delayed, challenged and blocked through coordinated litigation campaigns whose financial backers often remain hidden from public view.Our legal system should never become another avenue for foreign governments, ideological activists, and commercial competitors to influence U.S. policy while hiding behind shell companies and nonprofit fronts.If foreign capital can quietly underwrite lawsuits designed to delay pipelines, data centers, challenge defense contractors, cripple domestic manufacturing, and increase costs for American businesses, then litigation funding becomes a national security issue — not merely a legal one.Trump has an opportunity to lead where previous administrations have not. By directing the executive branch to maximize transparency in third-party litigation funding and by urging Congress to pass H.R. 2675 and H.R. 1109, he can help restore public confidence in our courts while protecting America’s economic and national security interests.For years, Republicans have fought to expose hidden influence in government, universities, the media, and foreign lobbying. The same principle should apply to America’s courtrooms. If the rule of law is to command public confidence, the public deserves to know who is paying to shape it.But this should not even be a partisan issue. Every American — Republican, Democrat, or Independent — should agree that justice works best in the open.WHY ARE TRIAL LAWYERS PRACTICING MEDICINE IN OUR LIVING ROOMS?Under the Sixth Amendment, Americans have the right to meet their accusers, but with third-party litigation funding, that fundamental right is being subverted at the behest of foreign interests. It has no place in a system built on equal justice under law.To fully develop American energy independence and manufacturing potential, America’s legal system should not be a harbor for competitors and foreign adversaries to exploit and set innovation back. Make America Great Again means defending not only our borders and our economy, but also the integrity of the legal institutions that sustain our constitutional republic. Bringing sunlight to the hidden financing of litigation is an America First reform whose time has come.Robert Romano is the Executive Director of Americans for Limited Government.
