Fact Sheet: President Donald J. Trump Encourages Foreign Investment While Protecting National Security

Fact Sheets

TLDR

This “fact” sheet is for a recent memorandum that purports to promote foreign investment while claiming to protect national security, but contains misleading claims about Chinese agricultural land ownership, omits that Canada owns the largest share of foreign-owned farmland, and faces practical challenges in implementation while potentially compromising environmental and AI safety regulations.

This is a “fact” sheet for a recent memorandum purportedly aimed at promoting foreign investment while protecting America’s national security interests.

The claims about foreign ownership of U.S. agricultural land are misleading. Canada, not China, owns the largest portion — about one-third of all foreign-owned land.

It overstates concerns about Chinese farmland ownership. Chinese investors hold only 277,336 acres, representing just 0.02% of all privately held U.S. agricultural land. This is significantly less threatening than implied by the fact sheet’s emphasis on Chinese ownership.

The “fact” sheet fails to mention that foreign-held agricultural land growth is primarily driven by:

  • Renewable energy investments from European entities
  • Canadian, Dutch, Italian, UK, and German investors collectively owning 28% of foreign-held land

The promise of expedited environmental reviews for $1 billion+ investments contradicts existing regulatory frameworks and could potentially compromise environmental safeguards.

While the “fact” sheet emphasizes the Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States’ (CFIUS) role in restricting Chinese investments, it omits that Chinese hackers recently breached the Treasury Department’s CFIUS office itself, raising questions about the effectiveness of these controls.

The policy appears to continue existing outbound investment regulations initiated by the Biden administration in late 2024, rather than introducing entirely new measures as implied.

While claiming U.S. technology leadership, the fact sheet ignores that the administration has simultaneously revoked previous AI safety measures and regulations, potentially compromising the security and reliability of emerging technologies.

The policy’s promises face significant practical hurdles:

  • The need to balance economic openness with national security concerns during economic crisis
  • Complexity of distinguishing between beneficial and threatening investments
  • Potential economic impact of restricting international capital flows
  • Risk of retaliatory measures from affected nations

MAKING AMERICA THE WORLD’S GREATEST DESTINATION FOR INVESTMENT**:**

Today, President Donald J. Trump signed a National Security Presidential Memorandum (NSPM) aimed at promoting foreign investment while protecting America’s national security interests, particularly from threats posed by foreign adversaries like the People’s Republic of China.

  • The NSPM establishes that welcoming foreign investment is crucial for economic growth, job creation, and innovation, ensuring that the United States leverages its world-leading financial markets to support American jobs and innovators.
  • The United States will create a “fast-track” process to facilitate greater investment from specified allies and partners, with conditions that prevent investors from partnering with our foreign adversaries in corresponding areas. The United States will also expedite environmental reviews for any investment over $1 billion.
  • The Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States (CFIUS) will be used to restrict Chinese investments in strategic U.S. sectors like technology, critical infrastructure, healthcare, agriculture, energy, raw materials, and others.
  • The United States will protect our farmland and real estate near sensitive facilities, strengthen CFIUS authority over “greenfield” investments, and restrict foreign adversary access to U.S. talent and operations in sensitive technologies.
  • Rather than use overly bureaucratic, complex, and open-ended “mitigation” agreements for U.S. investments from foreign adversaries, more administrative resources will be directed toward facilitating investments from key partner countries.
  • The United States will establish new rules to curb the exploitation of its capital, technology, and knowledge by foreign adversaries such as China to ensure that only those investments that serve American interests are allowed.
  • The Trump Administration will consider new or expanded restrictions on U.S. outbound investment to China in sensitive technologies, including semiconductors, artificial intelligence, quantum, biotechnology, aerospace, and more, to stop American funds from supporting China’s Military-Civil Fusion (MCF) strategy.
  • The United States will continue to encourage passive investments from all foreign persons – this will allow our cutting-edge businesses to continue to benefit from foreign capital while safeguarding our national security.
  • The Trump Administration will protect U.S. investors’ savings and boost American prosperity by auditing foreign companies on U.S. exchanges, reviewing their ownership structures and any alleged fraud, and ensuring foreign adversary companies are ineligible for pension plan contributions.

ENSURING AMERICA’S PROSPERITY AND SECURITY**:**

President Trump is committed to making the United States a premier destination for investment while balancing national security interests.

  • The United States is the leading innovator of next-generation technologies, and this action makes it easier for our friends to support U.S. innovators and economic growth.

  • Certain foreign countries, including China, systematically direct investment in American companies to gain access to cutting-edge technology, intellectual property, and leverage in strategic industries, which must be countered.

    • Foreign entities and individuals hold roughly 43 million acres of U.S. agricultural land, which is nearly 2% of all land in the U.S.

    • China owns more than 350,000 acres of farmland across 27 states.

  • China is exploiting our capital and ingenuity to fund and modernize their military, intelligence, and security operations, posing direct threats to United States security with weapons of mass destruction, cyber warfare, and more.

  • Chinese hackers have repeatedly targeted U.S. entities, including recently breaching the Treasury Department’s CFIUS office, the entity responsible for reviewing foreign investments for national security risks.

SAFEGUARDING AMERICAN INNOVATION**:**

President Trump is keeping his promise to prevent foreign adversaries from taking advantage of the United States.

  • President Trump: “We will also adopt new rules to stop U.S. companies from pouring investments into China, and to stop China from buying up America, allowing all of those investments that clearly serve American interests.”

    • President Trump also promised to “stop Chinese-owned” firms from “stealing our intellectual property, our workers’ knowledge and then sending it back to Communist China. We’re not going to let that happen.”

    • President Trump: “We have powers that haven’t really been used in terms of environmental. If you invest over $1 billion in the United States, we’re going to give expedited reviews.”

  • This NSPM builds on numerous actions President Trump took in his first term to protect American innovation, including:

    • Initiating a Section 301 investigation into China’s practices related to forced technology transfer, unfair licensing, and intellectual property policies.

    • Announcing a Department of Justice China Initiative to identify and prosecute trade secrets theft, hacking, and economic espionage – a program which the Biden Administration ended.

    • Prioritizing research and development of America’s artificial intelligence capabilities.

    • Taking action to prevent foreign malign actors from gaining access to United States information networks.