Congressional Investigations Quarterly

Designed for busy in-house counsel, government affairs professionals, policy advocates, and legal practitioners seeking to navigate the ins and outs of congressional oversight, this edition of MoFo’s “Congressional Investigations Quarterly” dives into the topics currently dominating congressional investigations, including trending tech policy issues such as online safety, artificial intelligence, and content moderation; scrutiny of tax-exempt entities and corporate contributions to the White House ballroom project; investigations implicating how companies responded to DOJ subpoenas in the last administration; and an analysis of how the historic government shutdown impacted the congressional investigations agenda.

On the Rise: Three Tech Policy Issues to Watch.

• Online Safety. Members of Congress continue to prioritize online safety, particularly for children. In September, the Senate Judiciary Committee Subcommittee on Privacy, Technology, and the Law held a hearing on whistleblower allegations regarding the nondisclosure of research on child safety. Days later, a bipartisan group of 10 senators sent a letter requesting information in response to those allegations. The hearing and letter come amid continued calls for the passage of the Kids Online Safety Act, which previously received widespread bipartisan support when it passed the Senate in July 2024 with a 91–3 vote.
  
  Relatedly, artificial intelligence (AI) chatbots have been the source of broad bipartisan scrutiny this fall. Both the Senate Judiciary Committee and the House Energy & Commerce Oversight & Investigations Subcommittee held hearings to examine the harms of AI chatbots following ongoing reporting about the risks posed to children. Bipartisan groups of senators across committees, including Senate Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions Committee Chairman Bill Cassidy (R-LA), sent letters to multiple technology companies seeking information on the risks and harms of AI chatbots. These investigations have yielded legislative proposals to restrict children’s access to chatbots and establish a federal civil cause of action that could be brought against developers and deployers of AI by victims harmed by AI systems.  
  
  The trend of protecting consumers, particularly children, from the potential harms of technology is also evident in recent scrutiny of app safety. The House Oversight Committee has launched an investigation into an online application’s policies allowing the generation of inappropriate and personal content regarding women and minors. Representative Nancy Mace (R-SC), Chairwoman of the House Oversight Subcommittee on Cybersecurity, Information Technology, and Government Innovation, has also initiated an investigation into a company’s responses to reports of sexual assault and misconduct incidents related to the use of the company’s app. Both indicate an interest in addressing the safety risks that consumers incur when using certain applications.
• Artificial Intelligence Content. Members of Congress continue to monitor whether AI developers and algorithms produce fair and accurate content. In October, Senate Commerce Committee Chairman Ted Cruz (R-TX) sent a letter to the Wikimedia Foundation alleging that it exhibits political bias. Cruz’s press release suggests this alleged bias could impact AI systems, an issue he has raised, for example, in a previous Senate Commerce Committee inquiry into a nonprofit advocating for “left-wing” AI regulations. In late October, Senator Marsha Blackburn decried a company’s large language model for generating “defamatory and patently false material.” Democrats have also expressed concern over what they feel are politically motivated efforts to regulate AI development and content. This bipartisan focus signifies agreement that AI systems must be “impartial and factual” but also disagreement as to what that looks like and how to get there.
• Content Moderation and Censorship. As noted in our last edition of “Congressional Investigations Quarterly,” Congress remains engaged in a variety of ongoing inquiries regarding free speech and censorship. In September and October 2025, the Senate Commerce Committee held hearings and issued a report examining how the Biden administration allegedly pressured technology companies to censor speech on online platforms. House Judiciary Committee Chairman Jim Jordan (R-OH) also announced that following a years-long investigation by the committee, a technology company acknowledged it had been pressured by the Biden administration to censor user-generated content regarding COVID-19. House Judiciary Committee Ranking Member Jamie Raskin (D-MD) followed up with a letter probing what he described as a “coerced confession” that contradicted prior employee testimony and came within days of a settlement with President Trump. The House Judiciary Committee also continued its investigation into the extraterritorial impact of foreign content moderation laws with a September hearing titled “Europe’s Threat to American Speech and Innovation,” followed by a November subpoena demanding documents from a technology company on its engagement with foreign governments. Chairman Jordan’s interest in this issue has implications for technology companies and non-governmental organizations alike.
  
  While Congress is active in investigating instances of censorship, members of Congress are also expressing concerns regarding so-called “radicalization” on online forums, renewed by the assassination of conservative activist Charlie Kirk. Both the House Homeland Security Committee and the House Oversight Committee have asked online platforms to share information regarding their policies on identifying and reporting extremist content, including content related to political violence, and the radicalization of online forum users.

Hot Topics: Philanthropy and Tax-Exempt Entities, the White House Ballroom Project, and DOJ Oversight.

• Philanthropy and Tax-Exempt Entities. Philanthropy and the work of tax-exempt entities more broadly have attracted wide-ranging scrutiny from both Congress and the Trump administration. After Charlie Kirk’s assassination, President Trump took executive action, issuing a September 22, 2025 Executive Order designating Antifa as a domestic terrorist organization, and a September 25, 2025 National Security Presidential Memorandum with the stated goal of countering domestic terrorism and organized political violence. On November 13, 2025, the State Department announced the designation of four international groups as Specially Designated Global Terrorists and further announced its intent to designate all four groups as Foreign Terrorist Organizations. Together, these actions signal a shift in enforcement priorities.
  
  Members of Congress have amplified these efforts through their own inquiries and investigations, including asking House leadership to form a select committee to investigate non-governmental organizations and prominent donors. In October, House Ways & Means Committee Chairman Jason Smith (R-MO) sent a letter to the IRS as part of its investigation into the tax-exempt status of multiple organizations for alleged ties to foreign terrorist organizations, illegal activities in the United States, and failure to operate within their stated exempt purpose. In November, House Judiciary Committee Chairman Jordan and Rep. Chip Roy (R-TX) initiated investigations into nonprofit organizations that allegedly support Antifa. In response to these developments, Democrats in the House and Senate—including on the Senate Finance Committee and House Ways & Means Committee—sent letters to the Treasury Department raising concerns that the IRS will undertake politically motivated investigations of Democratic donors and tax-exempt entities. Chairman Smith and Senate Judiciary Chairman Chuck Grassley (R-IA) have also demanded documents from prominent foundations relating to alleged ties to designated foreign adversaries.
• The White House Ballroom Project. Democrats have initiated investigations into corporate support for the White House ballroom project. Democratic leadership on the Senate Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations and the House Committee on Homeland Security sent letters to the corporate donors that supported the construction of a White House ballroom, as well as to the companies involved in the project planning and execution. The donations, managed by the nonprofit Trust for the National Mall, came from companies across the technology, finance, defense, and telecommunications sectors. These kinds of inquiries, relating to corporate support for initiatives favored by President Trump and corporate America’s interaction with his administration, could foreshadow the Democrats’ oversight agenda if they win a congressional majority in the midterm elections.
• Department of Justice Oversight Implicating Corporate Subpoena Recipients. Congressional Republicans recently discovered that the Department of Justice under the Biden administration sought cell phone “tolling data” of members of Congress in connection with former Special Counsel Jack Smith’s now-closed investigation into the 2020 election. In response, both the House and Senate Judiciary Committees sent letters to telecommunications companies requesting documents related to the investigation. The House and Senate Judiciary Committees have since broadened their inquiries to include other types of companies, including financial institutions, technology providers, and social media companies that may have received subpoenas in connection with DOJ’s investigation. The House Judiciary Committee has also demanded testimony from Smith related to the investigation.
• Referrals to DOJ. Republican-led House committees have also recently issued referrals to the Department of Justice seeking criminal investigations. House Judiciary Committee Chairman Jordan referred former CIA Director John Brennan and former Senior Assistant Special Counsel to Jack Smith, Thomas Windom, for potential criminal investigation. The House Oversight Committee referred for investigation three Biden White House aides, who refused to answer questions and asserted their Fifth Amendment rights in response to subpoenas issued by the committee. The House Oversight Committee referrals were issued in connection with the committee’s recent report on President Biden’s decision-making processes, which found that “Biden’s inner circle sought to deceive the public [and] cover-up his decline,” and that executive actions signed through President Biden’s use of an “autopen” could be deemed void.

Big Picture Developments: Government Oversight Amid a Shutdown.

• Congress has ended the longest government shutdown in U.S. history. As part of his shutdown strategy, Speaker Mike Johnson (R-LA) kept the House in recess while the Senate attempted to pass a Continuing Resolution. While House members and committees continued to send oversight letters throughout the shutdown, other committee activities, such as hearings and markups, were paused. This condenses the calendar for the House’s congressional oversight agenda before the 2026 midterm elections. Although business continued as usual in the Senate, including hearings, significant floor time was spent voting on funding measures. Oversight activities will likely increase now that Congress has returned to its regular schedule, following the passage of a resolution to fund the government through January 30, 2026. Beginning in January, we expect intensified oversight with evolving priorities shaped by midterm election dynamics.

At the time of publication of this update, Congress initiated a rare bipartisan and bicameral push for oversight of recent U.S. military strikes on suspected drug vessels in the Caribbean. In addition, the House Financial Services Committee issued its report titled “Operation Choke Point 2.0: Biden’s Debanking of Digital Assets." These developments will be closely monitored for future updates.

Public policy advisor, Deanna Segall, contributed to this alert.