On the heels of losing his purported plea deal agreement, Hunter Biden is experiencing numerous legal challenges. Last week, he pleaded not guilty to federal charges, after his deal with the government was struck down by a federal judge. The Delaware federal judge cited the foreign agency law in Hunter Biden’s hearing last week when she negated a plea deal between Biden and U.S. Attorney David Weiss.

Simultaneously, a federal lawsuit against the Department of Justice was filed, to force Hunter Biden to register as a federal agent.

As noted in the complaint filed by the Americal Legal Justice Foundation against Attorney General Merrick Garland and the Department of Justice, the Foreign Agents Registration Act, Pub. L. No. 75–583 (FARA) requires “certain agents of foreign principals who are engaged in political or other specified activities to make periodic public disclosure of their agency relationship and of the activities, receipts, and disbursements in support of thereof.” Citing the Act’s legislative history, the complaint goes on to describe FARA as “the paradigmatic public disclosure statute, enacted for the express purpose of ensuring citizens are “informed as to the identities and activities of ” so that they will “be better able to appraise them and the purposes for which they act.”

Republicans have long argued and then accused Hunter Biden of having secret dealings with China, Romania, and Ukraine, where he allegedly profited as the son of then-Senator Joe Biden. The new proposed plea deal that was thrown out by a judge last week ends an ongoing investigation into Hunter Biden’s dealings by the FBI, federal prosecutors, and IRS officials.

Yet the accusations against Hunter Biden remain uncorroborated.

The lawsuit was filed by the conservative America First Legal Foundation, a national nonprofit legal foundation with a mission to “oppose the radical left’s anti-jobs, anti-freedom, anti-faith, anti-borders, anti-police, and anti-American crusade.”

Court documents allege that “No later than November 2019, when it obtained possession of and verified the authenticity of Hunter Biden’s laptop computer, the Department of Justice had actual knowledge that Hunter Biden has been a statutorily defined foreign agent of (at a minimum) Ukrainian and Chinese principals and therefore was legally obligated to register as such. However, the Department has neither required Mr. Biden to register nor undertaken a waiver rulemaking.”

Foreign agent registration offers transparency as to the relationships that individuals or companies have with foreign businesses and “high-ranking officials and their family members.” The Foreign Registration Act was, until Donald Trump’s presidency, a dormant law, designed to force specific Americans to register as foreign agents, for reasons of transparency.

White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre released a statement at the White House conference last week, asking journalists to contact Hunter Biden’s legal team, explaining that "Hunter Biden is a private citizen, and this was a personal matter for him." The statement continued, "As we have said, the president, the first lady, they love their son, and they support him as he continues to rebuild his life. This case was handled independently, as all of you know, by the Justice Department under the leadership of a prosecutor appointed by the former president, President Trump.”

To date, under the FARA law, seven criminal cases have been brought against Americans by the DOJ, all related to former president Donald Trump.

Former Donald Trump campaign manager Paul Manafort pleaded guilty to FARA charges, serving two years in prison before being pardoned by then-president Trump.

Sam Patten, who worked with Manafort, also pleaded guilty to FARA charges. Richard Gates, the former deputy campaign manager for Trump, pleaded guilty to charges. Trump advisor and friend Tom Barrack was charged but was acquitted by the DOJ. Barrack’s former assistant Matthew Grimes was charged with FARA violations, and former Trump national security adviser Michael Flynn pleaded guilty twice to lying to the FBI before his case was dropped. Flynn was pardoned by Trump in 2020.