Economic Espionage: Expanding Penalties for Foreign Adversaries
To amend section 1839 of title 18, United States Code, to provide that an entity domiciled in a foreign adversary country is a foreign instrumentality for purposes of the prohibition on economic espionage under such section.
The House Committee on the Judiciary received this bill on July 20, 2026. It has not moved since that date and remains under committee review. The bill must receive a vote or further action from this committee to move forward.
While there is strong bipartisan support for being tough on China, bills introduced this late in a session often run out of time before they can pass both chambers.
Scores run from -100 (strongly harmful) to +100 (strongly beneficial) for each group, combining impact, certainty, scope, and duration ratings of 1-5. How impact scoring works
Researchers, engineers, and other visa holders who collaborate with or work for companies based in China or other listed countries face a lower legal bar for being charged with economic espionage, since prosecutors no longer need to prove government control of the foreign company. This mirrors concerns raised during past crackdowns on academic and industry ties to China, where visa holders were disproportionately investigated.
Referred to the House Committee on the Judiciary.
Introduced in House
The bill was officially filed and given a number. It now enters the legislative queue.
A group of senior Republican lawmakers has introduced legislation that would make it easier for US prosecutors to pursue economic espionage cases involving Chinese companies by treating all businesses based in China as instruments of the Chinese state under federal law.
Legislation introduced on July 20 by U.S. Rep. John Moolenaar (R-MI) would expand federal economic espionage law by treating companies based in countries designated as foreign adversaries as foreign government instrumentalities, making it easier to prosecute the theft of U.S. trade secrets.
Chairman John Moolenaar and Senators John Cornyn and Tom Cotton introduced the Stop PRC Economic Espionage Act, which would treat any entity domiciled in China, Russia, Iran, or North Korea as a 'foreign instrumentality,' erasing the 'private company' fiction in espionage cases.
No votes recorded for this bill yet.
Document Type
Congressional Bill
Official Title
To amend section 1839 of title 18, United States Code, to provide that an entity domiciled in a foreign adversary country is a foreign instrumentality for purposes of the prohibition on economic espionage under such section.
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