Have you used AI?

None

Bug Description

export const data = require("./data.json");

in production build since 5.107.1 this exports empty object.

Link to Minimal Reproduction and step to reproduce

https://github.com/Knagis/webpack-json-req-issue

Expected Behavior

exported variable has the contents of the JSON file

Actual Behavior

empty object exported.

Environment

System:
    OS: Windows 11 10.0.26200
  Binaries:
    Node: 24.11.1
    Yarn: 1.22.22
  Packages:
    webpack: 5.107.2 => 5.107.2 
    webpack-cli: ^7.0.2 => 7.0.2

Is this a regression?

Yes (please specify version below)

Last Working Version

5.107.0

Additional Context

using the imported json data inside the module itself (even simple console.log(data)) mitigates the issue.