H.R. 5811 · 119th Congress
Restoring America’s Leadership in Innovation Act of 2025
Key: what the circles and colors mean
Each circle is a bill. The ring fills as it moves through Congress:
Under the number: the Yea · Nay count of its final (or latest) recorded vote. On a member's page, the small badge is how that member voted: Y Yea / Aye, N Nay / No, P Present, – Not voting.
Gold and violet are only for Yea and Nay; they never mean a party. A member's party is the letter on their photo.
Not yet voted on. This bill is still a proposal: it hasn't reached a floor vote, and its text can change in committee or on the floor before any vote.
R
MassieSponsor6 cosponsors · 1 D, 5 R
5 signed on when it was introduced; the rest joined later. Cosponsors who withdrew aren't shown.
The bill changes the U.S. patent system back to a first-to-invent system, in which the first inventor to conceive of an invention is entitled to a patent. Currently, the first person to file an application that meets all the necessary requirements is entitled to the patent.
What it does: CRS summary · Introduced in House · Oct 24, 2025
Restoring America's Leadership in Innovation Act of 2025
This bill revises several aspects of patent law.
The bill changes the U.S. patent system back to a first-to-invent system, in which the first inventor to conceive of an invention is entitled to a patent. Currently, the first person to file an application that meets all the necessary requirements is entitled to the patent.
Several types of administrative patent challenge proceedings are abolished, as well as the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) body that decides those proceedings.
The bill relaxes the standard for what constitutes patent-eligible subject matter. The only ineligible inventions shall be those that exist in nature independent or prior to human activity or that exist solely in the human mind.
The bill also makes it easier for a patent owner that has won an infringement case in court to secure a permanent injunction against the infringing defendant. Specifically, there shall be a presumption that further infringement would cause irreparable harm to the prevailing patent owner, and the burden shall be on the infringer to prove otherwise. (Currently, a prevailing patent owner seeking a permanent injunction must prove, among other things, that further infringement would cause irreparable harm.)
The bill limits what types of publications shall be treated as prior art that could be used to make an invention be considered to be anticipated or obvious (and therefore not patentable).
The bill authorizes the USPTO to keep and spend all the fees that it collects.
Written by the nonpartisan Congressional Research Service. All summary versions on Congress.gov
About this bill and sources
Official title: Restoring America’s Leadership in Innovation Act of 2025
Latest action (Oct 24, 2025): Referred to the House Committee on the Judiciary.
Policy area: Commerce · Origin: House · Introduced: Oct 24, 2025
Official page on Congress.gov · Bill text (GovInfo) · Status record (XML)
No recorded floor vote found.