Hill Democrats probing Trump’s mineral megadeals

Lawmakers in both chambers want to know how the administration is selecting what companies to invest in.

February 02, 2026

Top House and Senate Democrats are investigating the Trump administration's unprecedented move to directly invest or take equity stakes in more than a half-dozen mining and mineral companies.

Senate Energy and Natural Resources ranking member Martin Heinrich (D-N.M.), House Natural Resources ranking member Jared Huffman (D-Calif.) and House Oversight ranking member Robert Garcia (D-Calif.) are demanding documents and a briefing from the secretaries of Energy, Defense, Commerce and Interior.

“By privileging select corporations through direct ownership — essentially picking winners and losers — the government may undermine broader market competition and the development of innovative technologies or mineral or material substitutions,” the lawmakers wrote in letters to the agencies Monday.

When asked about the letters, White House spokesperson Kush Desai said the president "remains committed to reshoring critical manufacturing and supporting American companies with a full policy suite of tariffs, tax cuts and deregulation."

Desai said the administration’s equity stakes in private companies represent "how we are investing in the long-run success of American technology and manufacturing" and that "the safeguarding of America’s supply chain cannot be further delayed by more red tape and bureaucracy."

The administration has moved to directly invest or take equity stakes in at least seven companies. Last month, it signaled its intent to take an equity stake and inject the largest amount to date — $1.6 billion — into USA Rare Earth, an Oklahoma-based firm angling to expand the production of rare earth elements outside China.

Before that, the government moved to take direct equity stakes in companies like MP Materials, Lithium Americas, Trilogy Metals, Vulcan Elements and the U.S. operations of Korea Zinc, arrangements that have raised eyebrows on and off Capitol Hill. Trump officials have said more deals are in the offing.

The Democrats on Monday demanded the legal justification for the equity stakes, the criteria for selecting the companies and policies in place to prevent conflicts of interest.

"To date, there has been no public disclosure of procedures or safeguards in place to ensure these ownership stakes do not influence permitting decisions, regulation generation, alteration, or enforcement, contracting decisions, or any other agency decisions relating to these mining and minerals projects," they wrote.

The lawmakers are also probing whether administration officials, their families, Trump campaign donors or Trump Organization affiliates hold personal stakes in any of these companies — and what happens to taxpayer money if the deals go sideways.

The Democrats accused the administration of moving to "shield its dealmaking from scrutiny" when the president issued an executive order last year that waived congressional notification requirements under the Defense Production Act for projects exceeding $50 million.

The order waived Securities and Exchange Commission disclosure requirements that normally force mining companies to prove their projects are economically viable before attracting investors, protections designed to prevent American taxpayers and investors from getting burned on speculative ventures, wrote Huffman, Heinrich and Garcia.

The GOP megabill, they added, provided nearly $13 billion for direct DPA grants and about $350 billion in available financing for critical minerals and related projects, which the lawmakers said gave the administration “no-strings-attached resources to buy stakes in private companies."

The administration also recently expanded to funding equity deals through a $39 billion fund created by the CHIPS and Science Act of 2022.


By:  Hannah Northey
Source: E&E News