Trump policy change prompts bid to dismiss foreign agent case

By Luc Cohen and Chris Prentice

MIAMI (Reuters) -After Attorney General Pam Bondi on her first day in office last month said the U.S. would limit its enforcement of foreign agent laws, defense lawyer Edward Shohat spotted an opening to get a high-profile case dismissed.

The Justice Department did not immediately grant his request to drop charges against former Republican Congressman David Rivera, who was charged in 2022 with acting as an unregistered agent of Venezuela's government, Shohat said on Thursday at a conference in Miami hosted by the American Bar Association.

But Shohat's gambit came as defense lawyers more broadly are invoking the Justice Department's shifting enforcement policies under U.S. President Donald Trump to try to convince prosecutors to drop investigations and cases against their clients brought before Trump's Jan. 20 inauguration, three lawyers familiar with the trend told Reuters at the conference.

The Justice Department did not immediately respond to a request for comment. Reuters could not immediately determine how many requests to drop cases the Justice Department had received, or what the results of those requests were.

It is not unusual for defense lawyers to seek to have their clients’ cases revisited when a new administration comes into office, but in the past it has been less common for white collar cases.

In her February 5 memorandum, Bondi said cases alleging violations of U.S. foreign agent laws should be limited to cases involving traditional espionage. Separately, on February 10, Trump directed Bondi to pause prosecutions of Americans accused of bribing foreign officials to win business. 

Those shifts came after, Trump, a Republican, signed an executive order vowing to end what he called the "weaponization" of law enforcement. 

Trump has long asserted, without evidence, that now-dropped criminal charges brought against him over his efforts to hold on to power after his 2020 election loss and handling of classified documents were efforts by former Democratic President Joe Biden to "weaponize" the justice system against him. 

Former Acting Deputy Attorney General Emil Bove cited Trump's "weaponization" executive order in directing federal prosecutors to drop a corruption case against New York mayor Eric Adams, who has pleaded not guilty to charges of taking bribes from Turkish officials.  

A judge is weighing the Justice Department's request to drop the case. 

Others are seeking similar treatment.

Shohat said on Thursday he sent an email to Bove and Bondi asking for Rivera's case to be dropped, and later discussed the matter on a Zoom call with a Justice Department official. On Friday, Shohat told Reuters that the official told him the agency would not be intervening for now but would continue to monitor the case, without saying why.

Trump has tightened oil sanctions on Venezuela, whose socialist President Nicolas Maduro is a longtime U.S. foe. Trump says Maduro has not met conditions to hold fair elections, and is not cooperating on taking back Venezuelan migrants deported from the United States. 

Rivera was charged in 2022 with acting as an agent of the Venezuelan government in the United States without registering, as is required by law. 

Prosecutors say he sought to improve bilateral ties and prevent further U.S. economic sanctions against Venezuela, and in exchange his company received $15 million from a subsidiary of the South American country's state oil company PDVSA. Rivera has pleaded not guilty.

Shohat said the allegations against Rivera did not constitute traditional espionage. He said he may now argue that his client is being selectively prosecuted. 

(Reporting by Luc Cohen and Chris Prentice in Miami;Editing by Noeleen Walder, Michael Perry and Louise Heavens)