The Trump administration is making an ongoing effort to destroy the database mandated by law to track the beneficial ownership of corporations and LLCs.
Posted by The Lawfare Podcast, Checked
- Sources
- 8 support
- Said
- 1 time·
- Confidence
- 90%
The Lawfare PodcastSep 14, 2026
The claim is supported: Treasury's FinCEN issued a final rule on August 11, 2026 ending beneficial ownership reporting for U.S. companies and said it would delete previously reported U.S. person information from the database, and states later sued in October to stop that deletion.
This claim is about the present, so it is judged as of the day it was checked.
What was said
… I understand that the administration doesn't want to enforce the law, uhm, uh, but can't someone prevent the total destruction of that database? As it stands today, I do not know the answer to this question. I am, uhm, uh, aware that this issue uh exists and that there is an, uh, an ongoing effort to destroy this database, but I do not know whether there has been litigation or who has brought it under what theory of standing. Do any of you have a sense of that? All right, we are going to wrap. Pardon me for the loud dogs, who are very excited, folks. This podcast is part of Lawfare's livestream series, Lawfare Live: The Trials and Tribulations of the Trump Administration. …
The Lawfare Podcast · · from the transcriptPost →What we found
Supports. The Treasury Department's FinCEN press release announced it would permanently end beneficial ownership reporting for U.S. persons and delete previously reported information from the beneficial ownership database.[2]
Supports. Reuters reported the August 2026 final rule exempting U.S. companies and individuals from reporting beneficial ownership information to the Treasury's financial crimes unit.[1][5]
Supports. Attorneys general of Washington and Rhode Island announced an October 27, 2026 multistate lawsuit to stop the administration from gutting the Corporate Transparency Act, and Dow Jones reported the suit also seeks to stop the government from deleting ownership information already collected.[3][4][6]
Supports. Reuters and The Globe and Mail both report that the rule exempts more than 99.9% of companies and that the government will destroy data already collected.[7][8]
Context. The lawsuits were filed after the 2026-09-14 posting date, and at that time no litigation had yet been reported; this does not contradict the claim that the administration was pursuing the deletion effort.[3][4][7]
Sources
8 sources: 1 fact-checker, 3 primary, 4 not rated
- 1Trump administration finalizes ownership reporting exemption for US firmsreuters.com · fact-checker · cited for: supports
- 2FinCEN Permanently Ends Beneficial Ownership ...home.treasury.gov · primary source · cited for: supports
- 3AG Brown sues to block the federal administration's gutting of ...atg.wa.gov · primary source · cited for: supports, context
- 4Attorney General Neronha, coalition sue Trump Administration for enabling fraud and corruptionriag.ri.gov · primary source · cited for: supports, context
- 5Trump administration finalizes ownership reporting exemption for U.S. firmstexarkanagazette.com · not rated · cited for: supports
- 6States Sue Treasury to Block Beneficial Ownership Rollbackriskjournal.dowjones.com · not rated · cited for: supports
- 7Trump administration sued over rollback of corporate ownership reporting rulesrmb.reuters.com · not rated · cited for: supports, context
- 8Opinion: Trump kills effort to unmask owners of U.S. shell companies giving cover to fentanyl traffickerstheglobeandmail.com · not rated · cited for: supports
Where this claim was made
Said in 1 published post