Ensuring Justice for Camp Lejeune Victims Act of 2025

Summary

Changes how Camp Lejeune exposure claims are handled in federal court by setting new venue rules, evidence and causation standards, limits on offsets and attorney fees, and centralizing coordinated pretrial matters in the Eastern District of North Carolina. The revisions apply retroactively to August 10, 2022 and affect any related claim pending or filed on or after the law’s enactment. The bill requires proof linking specific contaminant types to specific harms and at least 30 days of presence at Camp Lejeune, preserves jury trials on request, allows transfer for trial within the Fourth Circuit, requires expedited docketing for consolidated matters, and preserves existing statute-of-limitations and applicability rules from the original Act.

• Centralizes coordinated pretrial Camp Lejeune matters in the Eastern District of North Carolina and allows transfer for trial within the Fourth Circuit.
• Sets new causation and evidentiary rules requiring links between contaminant types and harms and at least 30 days’ presence at Camp Lejeune.
• Makes the Act retroactive to August 10, 2022 and applies to pending and newly filed claims.
• Pre-filing settlements are not offset against awards, but post-filing settlements or judgments may be offset by disability, Medicare, or Medicaid payments to the extent allowed by law.
• Caps attorney fees at 20% for pre-filing settlements and 25% for post-filing judgments or settlements, and requires proportional fee splits among firms.
• Preserves the right to a jury trial and requires expedited docketing for consolidated proceedings.
• Explicitly preserves existing applicability and statute-of-limitations provisions from the original Camp Lejeune law.
• Permits parties to agree to lower attorney fees than the statutory caps.
• Changes procedural and remedial litigation rules without altering core eligibility or statute-of-limitations rules from the prior Act.