Seven bipartisan sponsors introduced the Holocaust Expropriated Art Recovery Act of 2025 on May 22, 2025, as Senate Bill 1884. The bill would extend provisions of the Holocaust Expropriated Art Recovery Act (HEAR Act) of 2016 with respect to the statute of limitations on Nazi-era art recovery claims in U.S. courts, and would rebuke the Supreme Court’s disastrous ruling in 2021 that Nazi art loss victims from Germany were not the subject of takings in violation of international law. The bill is an important step in Holocaust-era art claims and should be passed.
I will have more commentary on this soon in connection with my forthcoming Chapman Law Review article about the recent interpretation of sovereign immunity in cultural property cases. For now, the important aspects of the bill are as follows:
- It would extend the original HEAR Act, which nationalized the statute of limitations for Nazi-era art claims at six years from the actual discovery of the facts and circumstances necessary to bring a claim (rather than constructive knowledge, which is the standard under most prior state law statutes of limitations), subject to certain carveouts for previously-known claims. The HEAR Act is currently set to sunset at the end of 2026, this bill would eliminate that sunset provision.
- It would expressly overrule F.R.G. v. Philipp, 141 S. Ct. 703 (2021), which imported into the text of the expropriation exception of the Foreign Sovereign Immunities Act a limitation on so-called “domestic takings,” such that the Nazis’ first comprehensive victims—Jews from Germany—are without recourse. S. 1884 corrects that error. As readers of the Art Law Report will know, I was proud to represent the plaintiffs in Philipp, which ignored the Genocide Convention of 1948 despite its undisputed status as a key component of international law.
- The bill also rebukes the conclusion in Philipp that the 2016 HEAR Act—which opens the courthouse doors—was somehow a law primarily directed to out of court solutions, now stating unequivocally: “The intent of this Act is to permit claims to recover Nazi-looted art to be brought.”
- It would eliminate other potential defenses such as laches, forum non conveniens, and the Act of State Doctrine, which were not addressed in the 2016 law.
Like the original HEAR Act, the bill has bipartisan sponsorship among Senators not ordinarily aligned politically: Democrats Richard Blumenthal (CT), Cory Booker (NJ), and John Fetterman (PA), as well as Republications Thomas Tillis (NC), Marsha Blackburn (TN), Eric Schmidt (MO), and Katie Boyd Britt (AL) . This bodes well.
I have written an article in the Chapman Law Review to be published shortly that will address this erroneous turn by the Roberts Court, why the death of Justice Scalia explains to some extent this policy-centric analysis, and advocates for legislation much like that which has been proposed. Stay tuned here for updates on that, soon.
