The Trump Administration’s Department of Justice (DOJ) has made clear that it will aggressively use the False Claims Act as part of its corporate enforcement program. The message is not subtle. Enforcement actions are accelerating, and the statute’s scope is being leveraged aggressively to advance broader economic, political, and cultural priorities.
Many non-U.S. companies may never have heard of the False Claims Act (FCA), and those who have may assume this U.S. law doesn’t apply to them. But if your company does business with the U.S. government, sells into federally funded programs, moves goods through U.S. ports, or pays U.S. duties, you may be exposed to substantial legal and financial risk in the U.S. under the FCA.
The FCA is a civil, not criminal, statute that imposes liability for knowingly submitting, or causing to be submitted, false or fraudulent claims for payment to the U.S. government, or making false statements that result in false claims being paid. The FCA also prohibits making false statements that lead to an underpayment of monies owed to the government, such as customs duties. The statutory framework includes whistleblower provisions that allow private individuals, including competitors and employees, to file lawsuits on the government’s behalf and to share in the government’s recovery.
In the past year alone, DOJ-initiated FCA investigations nearly tripled. Settlements and judgments under the FCA exceeded $2.9 billion in the 2024 fiscal year. A...
NEW YORK >> A federal judge ordered CVS Health’s Omnicare unit to pay $948.8 million in penalties and damages, in a whistleblower lawsuit claiming it fraudulently billed the U.S. government ...