A group of Republican U.S. Senators have reintroduced legislation that would require plaintiffs to disclose when they’ve secured third-party funding in litigation, the National Law Journal reported. Sens. Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa), John Cornyn (R-Texas), Thom Tillis (R-N.C.), and Ben Sasse (R-Neb.) yesterday reintroduced the Litigation Funding Transparency Act (LFTA). The bill would require disclosure of third-party litigation funding for class actions and multi-district litigation within 10 days of a case being filed, or 10 days after the closure of a funding deal. The bill, likewise, would require disclosure of financing to provide cash for plaintiffs. Grassley, Cornyn and Tillis proposed a prior version of the bill last year after a less extensive bill that called only for disclosure only in class actions passed out of the U.S. House of Representatives in 2017 — before Democrats took a majority of House seats in the November 2018 elections. The reintroduction of the bill comes as a group of 30 in-house counsel at 30 major companies have backed a proposal to amend Federal Rules of Civil Procedure to require full disclosure of third-party funding in litigation.
