Department of Justice

On October 7, 2026, United States Assistant Attorney General Colin M. McDonald issued Directive 26-13, “A Comprehensive Approach in the Fight Against Fraud,” (Comprehensive Approach Memo) to all personnel in the Department of Justice’s (DOJ) National Fraud Enforcement Division. The directive builds on the National Fraud Enforcement Division’s August 13, 2026, enforcement-priorities memorandum and describes how prosecutors are to use asset seizure, forfeiture, and civil injunctive tools against fraud proceeds. Read alongside a string of recent DOJ forfeiture actions, the directive describes early pursuit of assets as a priority area, rather than a step reserved for later in a criminal case.

White-Collar

On October 20, 2026, the Department of Justice and its National Fraud Enforcement Division (NFED) announced the Fraud Whistleblower Incentive Program, or WHIP. DOJ calls it the first whistleblower program to pay an up-front award for tips that lead to criminal charges, rather than waiting for a case to reach final resolution.

On October 1, 2026, the Department of Justice issued a follow-on directive sharpening and formalizing how trade and customs fraud will be investigated and prosecuted going forward, particularly where corporations are involved—building on an August 2026 memo and rule that created the National Fraud Enforcement Division (NFED).

Washington DC Capitol detail on cloudy sky

Three developments since October 1 extend the buildout of DOJ’s fraud enforcement infrastructure that we covered in our prior post on the Fraud Division’s Priorities Memo and Strike Force expansion. First, Assistant Attorney General Colin M. McDonald of the National Fraud Enforcement Division (the Fraud Division) issued Directive 26-12, a memorandum on the Division’s corporate enforcement priorities (Corporate Enforcement Memo). Second, the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania (EDPA) announced the creation of an Interagency Fraud Task Force (IFTF) combining the Fraud Division with 14 other federal agencies. Third, on October 7, AAG McDonald issued Directive 26-13, directing a comprehensive, all-tools approach across charging, asset recovery, cooperation, pretrial detention, and sentencing. Together, these developments continue DOJ’s effort to formalize both the substantive standards it will apply to fraud cases and the interagency infrastructure used to identify them.

On September 30, 2026, the University of Missouri-Kansas City School of Law hosted the inaugural Heartland Government Enforcement & Investigations Conference. The day-long program brought together federal prosecutors, judges, state regulators, in-house counsel, and private practitioners across seven substantive sessions spanning DOJ enforcement priorities, federal sentencing and discovery practice, healthcare fraud, legal ethics and artificial intelligence, state antitrust enforcement, internal investigations, and securities and commodities regulation. Below is a summary of each session.

Cyber security and protection of private information and data concept. Locks on blue integrated circuit. Firewall from hacker attack.

Federal prosecutors in the Southern District of New York have filed criminal complaints against two former Robinhood Markets, Inc. engineers, alleging they used confidential information about upcoming cryptocurrency listings on Robinhood Crypto to trade profitably on Hyperliquid, an offshore decentralized derivatives exchange. The scheme came to light after Robinhood conducted an internal investigation and referred the matter to law enforcement. The cases illustrate an emerging enforcement priority: prosecutors are extending traditional insider-trading theories to decentralized, unregistered derivatives markets.

Columns at courthouse entrance

Executive Summary

On September 18, 2026, the Department of Justice (DOJ) announced two substantial revisions to the Justice Manual that will materially affect False Claims Act (FCA) enforcement and defense strategy:

  • Guidance Documents: DOJ will no longer treat sub-regulatory guidance (CMS manuals, FDA interpretive memos, etc.) as creating independently enforceable legal obligations in FCA cases. The government must prove violations of statutes, regulations, or contracts.
  • Qui Tam Dismissals: DOJ will more actively consider dismissing qui tam cases in which DOJ declines to intervene, both at the time of declination and as the litigation proceeds. (Under the Supreme Court’s Polansky standard, reviewing courts are likely to grant these motions in all but extraordinary circumstances.)

As we move into the last months of 2026, the contours of white-collar enforcement differ in some notable ways from those that defined 2025. The Department of Justice (DOJ) has undergone structural shifts and reorganizations, new task forces have reached early milestones, and enforcement tools that had seen less use have reemerged. Below are six developments worth watching.

Cyber security and protection of private information and data concept. Locks on blue integrated circuit. Firewall from hacker attack.

This summer, defense contractors have received two very different signals about federal cybersecurity compliance. On one front, the Department of Justice (DOJ) is continuing to pursue False Claims Act (FCA) liability for contractors that misrepresent their cybersecurity posture—now with two settlements in quick succession targeting noncompliance with NIST SP 800-171 requirements. On the other, the newly renamed Department of War suspended the next phase of the Cybersecurity Maturity Model Certification (CMMC) program. Neither development changes the baseline obligations contractors already have, but together they illustrate how fluid—and consequential—this space remains.

Stethoscope on medical bills and health insurance claim form

Two announcements in the span of nine days reflect a significant expansion of federal healthcare fraud enforcement resources. On August 4, DOJ announced expansion of its Northeast Health Care Fraud Strike Force to Philadelphia, marking the fourth geographic expansion in less than a year. Nine days later, on August 13, Assistant Attorney General Colin M. McDonald issued a priorities memorandum for the National Fraud Enforcement Division (the Fraud Division), a new DOJ division announced by President Trump in January 2026 and formally established in April 2026, that places healthcare fraud second on a list of five enforcement priorities and describes plans to enhance the Strike Force model with additional resources, data analytics, and technology.