As of January 14, 2025 all information-filing requirements mandated by the Corporate Transparency Act (“CTA”) are suspended. If, when, and the extent to which this suspension will end is currently being considered by the United States Supreme Court and U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit. This article considers how what might have been anticipated to be a peaceful year-end holiday season saw all three levels of federal courts (District, Circuit, and Supreme), Congress and a bureau of the U. S. Department of Treasury frantically seeking to determine the future and timing of CTA reporting obligations, and how these events might shape future developments of the CTA.
On December 3, 2024, in Texas Top Cop Shop, Inc. v. Garland (“Top Cop District Litigation”)[3] brought by businesses and an individual owner (“plaintiffs” or “plaintiffs-appellees”)[4] against the Financial Crimes Enforcement Network (“FinCEN”), the bureau of the United States Department of the Treasury that administers the CTA; the United States Attorney General; and the Secretary of the Treasury (the “government”), the court issued a nationwide[5] preliminary injunction enjoining the CTA.[6] In response to the preliminary injunction, on December 23, 2024, FinCEN gave notice it would not enforce the CTA for so long as the injunction were in place.[7]
In response to the preliminary injunction, on December 5, 2024 the government filed a notice of appeal to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit (“Top Cop Fifth Circuit Litigation”)[8] and, on December 11, 2024, a Motion to Stay Preliminary Injunction Pending Appeal[9] in the Top Cop District Litigation. On December 12, 2024, the District court judge ordered the plaintiffs to respond to the government’s motion by December 16, 2024,[10] and on December 16, the plaintiffs filed a response,[11] followed by a government reply the next day. [12] On the December 17, the District Court judge denied the government’s motion.[13]
