Trump orders two-for-one repeal for all new regulations

Gregory Korte | USA TODAY

Show Caption Hide Caption Trump signs executive order on regulations President Donald Trump has signed an executive action aimed at significantly cutting regulations for small businesses. (Jan. 30)

WASHINGTON — President Trump promised a massive rollback of federal regulations on small businesses Monday, signing an executive action that he said would "knock out two regulations for every new regulation" adopted by federal agencies.

The order greatly strengthens the president's hand in overseeing agency regulations, putting a limit on each agency's regulatory ability through the annual budget process. And it requires that the costs of any new regulations be balanced through the repeal of at least two old regulations.

"We'll be reducing them big league and their damaging effects on our small businesses, our economy, our entrepreneurial spirit," Trump said before signing the order. "So the American Dream is back, and we are going to create an environment in small business like we haven't had in many, many decades."

The White House has kept a tight grip on agency regulations since at least the Carter administration, and changes in regulatory policy are a routine part of every presidential transition. But Trump's executive action seems to go even further than the usual changes to the cost-benefit analysis of new regulations. Trump himself called it "the largest cut by far, in terms of regulation," in history.

The executive order, titled, "Reducing Regulation and Controlling Regulatory Costs," leaves many of the details of the two-for-one mechanism up to the director of the White House Office of Management and Budget, and allows Congress to make exceptions. But the order will likely result in a continuation of the regulatory "freeze" the Trump White House instituted on his first day in office,

Under the Administrative Procedures Act, the repeal of old regulations requires the same bureaucratic process as the adoption of new regulations, with agency analysis, legal review public notice and comment. Because the order ties the regulatory cycle to the fiscal year, agencies would have to repeal old regulations by Sept. 30 in order to adopt any new regulations.

The order applies to all executive agencies, including those responsible for overseeing banking, pensions, the environment, health, transportation and workplace safety.

"If you have a regulation you want, number one, we're probably not going to approve it," Trump said, arguing that necessary regulations would have been already approved by previous administrations.

He said the new regulatory policy was specifically targeted at small businesses. "There will be regulation, there will be control, but there will be normalized control where you can open your business and expand your business," he said.

The signing of the regulatory order followed a meeting with small-business owners in the White House on Monday morning. He said the federal regulations had grown over both Republican and Democratic administrations. "This isn't a knock on President Obama. It’s a knock on many presidents who have preceded me," he said. "It got particularly bad in the last eight years."

Contributing: David Jackson

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