The Nuts and Bolts
Nothing good comes easy.
How DOGE is really going to work
The administration should move for legislation. It’s tough. It is risky. But it is better than the temporary, but unsustainable, reprieve that Musk and Ramaswamy talked about in their Wall Street Journal oped. People will just look through the “reform.”
It’s time for an island-hopping campaign. The enemy wants you to get bogged down in the jungle. The strategic goal of massive de-regulation remains. You can mop up afterwards.
People are skeptical enough.
‘DOGE will work with legal experts embedded in government agencies, aided by advanced technology, to apply these rulings to federal regulations enacted by such agencies. DOGE will present this list of regulations to President Trump, who can, by executive action, immediately pause the enforcement of those regulations and initiate the process for review and rescission.
‘I’m all for this (and more), but take a look at what we are getting here. Paused enforcement is better than nothing, but the rule doesn’t go away. In the meantime, private companies probably will continue to act as if the rule may continue, given limited time horizons in politics and indeed for DOGE itself. The process for “review and rescission” of course is extremely time-consuming and labor-intensive. Again, bring it on but just do not expect too much from this. Note further that “right-leaning regulatory troops” are quite thin on the ground, most of all in these agencies.’
Gary Gensler Gets Hit by the Law on His Way Out
The “Sue Everybody” SEC suffers another loss.
Characterizing everyone and his brother as a dealer may have been the shark-jumping moment of this SEC. Criminalization of trading securities is a bold move, Cotton.
‘Like so many of Mr. Gensler’s regulations, this one sought to expand the commission’s power over markets without Congressional authorization. The rule redefined dealer under the securities laws to include any person whose trading activity “regular[ly]” has the effect of “providing liquidity” to the market including asset managers, hedge funds and even day traders.
‘“As now defined, many of the world’s largest, most prominent market participants, including the Federal Reserve, may have been operating unlawfully as unregistered securities ‘dealers’ for 90 years without anyone—including the Commission—having previously noticed,” Judge Reed O’Connor noted. “Operating as an unregistered dealer under the Exchange Act is a felony.”’
Utilities Are Spending a Lot for Power Lines We May Not Need, and Spending Less on Ones We Do Need
Incentives matter, power transmission issue.
Regulation distorts the long-term decision-making of utilities. Go figure.
‘Certain kinds of projects can lead to easy money for utility companies, while others require a long and difficult approval process.
‘So it shouldn’t be surprising when the companies choose the easy path, which in this case means construction and maintenance of local transmission lines.
‘At the same time, the companies are focusing less on building large interstate transmission lines, which are essential for the transition away from fossil fuels, but also a challenge to get built because of rigorous vetting and a high likelihood of community opposition.
‘This is a problem, and customers pick up the costs through their electricity bills.’
Can Trump Bust Up the Beltway?
The only thing that matters is execution. All this talk about fealty-driven appointments is noise.
Either they can do what they say or they can’t.
‘Let’s not deny that obsequiousness fills the air just now. But also everywhere in our time is bureaucratic betrayal of the American people, whether undermining any conservative president’s policy goals or deploying the FBI against the last one. If the obsequious succeed in corralling Washington, few will complain.’
Recommendations from a former head of the Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs.
‘The Administrative Procedure Act is central to the relevant project. It needs to be mastered. It offers opportunities and obstacles. No one (not even the president) can clap and eliminate regulations. It’s important to know the differences among IFRs, TFRs, NPRMs, FRs, and RFIs. (The best of the bunch, for making rules or eliminating rules: FRs. They are final rules.)
The Paperwork Reduction Act needs to be mastered. There is far too much out there in the way of administrative barriers and burdens. The PRA is the route for eliminating them. There’s a process there.
The Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs is, for many purposes, the key actor here. (I headed the office from 2009-2012.) A reduce-the-regulations effort probably has to go through that Office. Its civil servants have a ton of expertise. They could generate a bunch of ideas in a short time.
It is important to distinguish between the flow of new burdens and regulations and the stock of old ones. They need different processes. The flow is a bit easier to handle than the stock.
The law, as enacted by Congress, leaves the executive branch with a lot of flexibility, but also imposes a lot of constraints. Some of the stock is mandatory. Some of the flow of mandatory. It is essential to get clarity on the details there.
The courts! It’s not right to say that recent Supreme Court decisions give the executive branch a blank check here. In some ways, they impose new obstacles. Any new administration needs a full understanding of Loper Bright, the major questions doctrine, Seila Law, and much more (jargon, I know, I know).’
EPA workforce ‘particularly susceptible’ to Trump’s Schedule F plans
“Even” the Trump Administration the first time around understood the performance and obstacles the bureaucracy at EPA put in their way.
The condescension of these people is part of the problem. They seem to think that they own the process. Not Congress. Not “even” the elected Executive Branch leadership.
‘Former agency officials across several administrations told reporters during a call hosted by the Environmental Protection Network that Trump’s pledge to bring back Schedule F and make federal employees in policymaking roles at-will hires would probably include a significant portion of the EPA’s approximately 15,000-employee workforce.
‘Jennifer Orme-Zavaleta, an EPN board member and former acting assistant administrator of EPA’s Office of Research and Development, told reporters that the EPA workforce is “particularly susceptible” to the return of Schedule F, “as are a number of other agencies across the government.”
‘“Part of the challenge by doing this, by politicizing the workforce and having a number of the people involved in rulemaking — and there are a lot — at-will, if we lose that workforce, if they are dismissed because they’re not following a particular direction and jumping as high as they’re being asked to jump, and I think that’s something that even the Trump administration recognized the first go-around,” Orme-Zavaleta said.’