Mr. Trump is not the first president to take on such frustrations.

President Bill Clinton declared that the federal government was failing to regulate “without imposing unacceptable or unreasonable costs on society.” He assigned Vice President Al Gore to collect agencies’ suggestions for rules that should go. One rule dictated how to measure the consistency of grits.

President George W. Bush’s regulatory overhaul focused more on how new regulations were created. The administration installed a political appointee inside each agency who generally had to sign off before any significant new rule could be initiated. At the E.P.A. for a time, that official came from an industry-funded think tank.

President Barack Obama ordered regular updates from each agency about the effectiveness of rules already on the books.

“When you raise the profile, when it’s clearly an executive priority, it gets attention,” said Heather Krause, director of strategic issues at the Government Accountability Office, the main auditor of the federal government. According to the auditor’s analysis, the effect under Mr. Obama was mostly to clarify and streamline rules, not eliminate them.

Like Mr. Bush, Mr. Trump has empowered political appointees. Though some agencies have included career staff members on their review teams, an executive order from Mr. Trump creating the teams does not require it — nonpolitical employees are generally believed to be more wedded to existing rules. And like Mr. Obama, Mr. Trump has imposed regular reporting requirements.

But Mr. Trump, who spent his business career on the other side of government regulations, has put an emphasis on cutting old rules.

The same day he signed the executive order initiating the review, he addressed a large crowd of conservative activists at a Maryland convention center.