Blog
What the DOGE debates really reveal
Last week I took part in a point/counterpoint on the Elon Musk-led Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE), making a brief case for its mission and…
Washington Examiner
Republicans ‘reimagine’ major regulatory reform to fit it in reconciliation bill
Washington examiner cited CEI’s expert on reform Wayne Crews, vice president for policy at the Competitive Enterprise Institute, told the Washington Examiner that this would give Congress…
Blog
Commencing deconstruction of the administrative state – Trump’s next 100 days
Federal regulation costs trillions of dollars each year. Call it the “costberg”—a vast, submerged amalgam of rules, guidance, and paperwork reshaping the economy without a…
930AM The Answer
Federal regulations cost average American household $16,000 a year, group finds
930AM The Answer cited CEI’s Ten Thousand Commandments report The nonpartisan Competitive Enterprise Institute released its annual Ten Thousand Commandments report Thursday. It shows that total…
Issues & Insights
Can Trump Kill This $2.2 Trillion Regulatory Beast?
Issues and Insights quoted CEI’s Ten Thousand Commandments report But that barely scratches the surface. Thursday, the Competitive Enterprise Institute released its annual “10,000 Commandments”…
NewsMax
Study: Biden’s ‘Hidden’ Tax on Households Hit $16K in 2024
NewsMax quoted CEI’s expert on Ten Thousand Commandments report Federal regulations imposed by the Biden administration reached costs of $2.16 trillion in 2024, generating a…
The Washington Times
Federal red ink now costs businesses more than $2.1 trillion per year, report says
The Washington Times quoted CEI’s expert on 10kc report “Congress should be held accountable for such large regulatory actions,” wrote Clyde Wayne Crews Jr., the…
Daily Caller
Cost Of Regulatory Burdens Reached Staggering Levels In 2024, Report Says
Daily Caller cited CEI’s expert on Ten Thousand Commandments report Federal regulations added an estimated total cost of a whopping $2.155 trillion for Americans in…
The National News Desk
Biden leaves behind $16,000 hidden tax for everyone
The National News Desk quoted CEI’s expert on Ten Thousand Commandments report That according to a new report released Thursday from The Competitive…
News Release
“Ten Thousand Commandments” report on federal regulatory burdens identifies problems, reforms
The Competitive Enterprise Institute today released its annual Ten Thousand Commandments report on the cost burden of federal regulations, revealing a cost exceeding $2 trillion,…
Products
Chapter 11: 2025 Unconstitutionality Index: 19 rules for every law 78
Article I of the Constitution notwithstanding, administrative agencies, not Congress, do most of America’s lawmaking. Congress enacts weighty legislation but delegates the details to agencies.
Products
Chapter 4: Regulatory dark matter
Although executive actions are typically supposed to deal with the internal operations of the federal government, they increasingly can have binding effect and influence private…
Products
Chapter 3: Numbers of rules and page counts in the Federal Register
The Federal Register is the daily repository of all proposed and final federal rules and regulations. Although its page counts are often cited as a…
Products
Chapter 2: Why we need a regulatory budget
The federal government publicly discloses its fiscal costs. It does not disclose most of its regulatory costs. Federal spending programs are funded either by taxes…
Products
Chapter 7:Unified Agenda of regulatory actions
Along with the Report to Congress, Federal Register, and Code of Federal Regulations, another vehicle for regulatory disclosure is the spring and fall editions of…
Products
Chapter 12: An agenda for rightsizing Washington
Rule counts regularly topped 4,000 in the 1990s. That is the wrong comparison for Biden-era lower rule counts. Those fewer rules have higher costs, are…
Products
Chapter 5: Well over 20,000 agency public notices annually
Presidents issue a few dozen memoranda and other proclamations each year. Departments and agencies issue thousands. These include guidance documents, notices, memoranda, letters, bulletins, action…
Products
Chapter 6: A note on rule reviews at OMB
OMB’s Biden-era shift to regulatory advocacy, particularly since the Circular A-4 rewrite, diminishes what can be gleaned from EO 12866 rule reviews. Nonetheless, like pages…
Products
Chapter 1: Biden’s whole-of-government push
Let’s be clear, Kamala and I came into office determined to transform how the economy works—change the way it literally functions. —Joe Biden, September 23,…
Products
Chapter 8: Federal regulations affecting small business
The aforementioned National Association of Manufacturers (NAM) report found that average annual per-employee regulatory costs to firms vary by firm size. The smaller the firm,…
Products
Chapter 10: GAO database on rules and major rules
The federal government’s regulatory reports and databases serve different purposes. The Federal Register presents all proposed and final rules, along with numerous presidential documents and…
Products
Chapter 9: Federal rules affecting state and local governments
State and local officials’ concerns over federal mandates’ overriding their own priorities resulted in the Unfunded Mandates Reform Act (UMRA) of 1995. It requires Congressional…
Study
Ten Thousand Commandments 2025
Introduction Record federal debt is contributing to record-setting regulatory burdens. While new spending programs show up in budget figures, new regulations requiring the private sector…
Blog
Earth Day is broken—only private conservation can fix it
With this week’s 2025 Earth Day came the usual media and progressive lawmaker fanfare lauding government programs and regulatory solutions to environmental concerns. But…
Blog
Don’t let the next crisis grow the government—again
“Now, I’m going to sign this, and it’s a great honor — $6.2 trillion. I’ve never signed anything with a “T”…
Forbes
Trump Reforms Die Without An Abuse-Of-Crisis Prevention Act
Amid frustrations with interventionist elements of the Trump agenda—such as tariffs and revived antitrust zeal—many have nevertheless been encouraged by the renewed…
Blog
The executive order that could kill trillion-dollar bailouts
The federal government doesn’t just spend—it also regulates through spending. That’s one reason crises so often inflate Washington’s role in American life. But as I…
News Release
President Trump announces Executive Orders aimed at slashing overregulation within federal agencies: CEI analysis
On Wednesday, President Trump announced several Executive Orders aimed at slashing overregulation in federal agencies through sunsetting and repealing outdated or unnecessary rules. The Orders…
WSJ Opinion
The Kid Rock-Kamala Coalition
WSJ Opinion cited CEI’s expert on the U.S. economy Now the White House is attacking secondary markets? Perhaps soon someone will have to explain…
Forbes
Trump’s Deregulation Gains Muscle—But Is He Skipping Leg Day?
The Trump 2.0 era has been marked by some extraordinary executive orders aimed at deregulation. These include E.O.14,192’s one-in, ten-out initiative; E.O. 14219’s installation of DOGE…
Blog
Trump’s deregulation push: Several steps forward—and some sideways
As I cover in a new column at Forbes, Trump 2.0 has brought a flurry of executive orders aimed at deregulation—one-in, ten-out rules,…
CPAC
Regulatory Tyranny, Congressional Abdication—and the Push to Take It All Back
Letters
CEI joins State Policy Network in coalition letter on Executive Order Unleashing Prosperity Through Deregulation
CPAC
CPAC 2025 and Beyond: A Roadmap to Lasting Regulatory Reform
CPAC has CEI’s expert speak on a panel about regulatory reform On Friday, February 21st, 2025, attendees at the Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC)…
Blog
Let the deconstruction commence
Congress’s actionable hierarchy for administrative state burial & constitutional resurrection Alongside restoring fiscal sanity, Congress must establish a hierarchy of actions to make Donald Trump’s…
Blog
14 priorities in slashing spending and regulation before ‘America 250’—#7 will shock you!
This past week, the House and Senate passed a continuing resolution (CR) that preserves Biden-era spending levels while largely turning a blind eye to…
Blog
Shutdowns are fake, but government growth is very real
With a government funding deadline looming on March 14, the House passed a continuing resolution (CR) to freeze non-defense spending at Fiscal Year 2024…
Op-Eds
Will Congress Ever Take The Libertarian Win And Embrace Automatic Shutdown?
Congress is at it again. With the March 14, 2025, funding deadline looming, the House is debating a continuing resolution (CR) that would…
News Release
Trump’s speech to Congress spotlights deregulatory efforts: CEI analysis
On Tuesday evening, President Trump delivered a speech to a joint session of Congress where he highlighted his administration’s deregulatory efforts across the federal government.
Blog
DOGE’s first cut at bureaucracy: A target inventory
Donald Trump’s Executive Order 14219, “Ensuring Lawful Governance and Implementing the President’s ‘Department of Government Efficiency’ Regulatory Initiative,” has set the stage for a major…
Blog
The FROGs are back: Will White House hop to it on guidance documents?
Donald Trump’s 2019’s Executive Order 13891, “Promoting the Rule of Law through Improved Agency Guidance Documents,” established online portals and inventories at…
Blog
The SCRUB Act: Washing away Washington’s regulatory grime
The Searching for and Cutting Regulations that are Unnecessarily Burdensome (SCRUB) Act, introduced today by Sen. Joni Ernst (R-IA), is a key step …
Joni Ernst
Ernst Makes President Trump’s Executive Action on Deregulation Permanent
Joni Ernst cited CEI’s expert on the SCRUB Act “The SCRUB Act and its Regulatory Cut-Go procedures mirror the new 10-for-one Trump architecture by requiring reduction that…
Blog
Trump executive order puts independent agencies on a leash
President Trump’s new executive order, “Ensuring Accountability for All Agencies,” marks a major shift in regulatory oversight by bringing independent agencies…
News Release
CEI applauds Sen. Ernst’s (R-IA) SCRUB Act
On Friday, U.S. Sen. Joni Ernst (R-IA) introduced the Searching for and Cutting Regulations that are Unnecessarily Burdensome (SCRUB) Act, which would task President…
Blog
Goodbye to the roaring twenties of regulation? A cost roundup
The final Report to Congress on the Benefits and Costs of Federal Regulations from the Biden administration appeared January 15. Here at the middle…
Dr. Rand Paul
Dr. Rand Paul Introduces REINS Act to Put Power Back in the People’s Hands
Blog
Zero to prosperity? New Trump executive order is a good start
Donald Trump’s return to the White House has brought a wave of executive orders, including his new “Unleashing Prosperity Through Deregulation” directive. Building on…
Daily Caller
It’ll Take More Than EOs For Trump’s Admin To Totally Slay Biden’s Mammoth ‘Whole-Of-Government’ Policy Push
Blog
A game-changing Trump executive order could nuke regulatory dark matter
In the wake of Donald Trump’s flurry of executive actions—including implementing a regulatory freeze, eradicating Biden’s diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) policies and staffing, and…
Forbes
A Banger Trump Executive Order Abolishing Regulatory Dark Matter
“[A] loathsome night-spawned flood of organic corruption more devastatingly hideous than the blackest conjurations of mortal madness and morbidity. Seething, stewing, surging, bubbling like serpents’…
Blog
Trump executive orders target Biden’s regulatory big bang
Joe Biden wrapped up his term with a parting regulatory surge, epitomized by today’s 872-page Federal Register—marking the apex of his aggressive midnight-rule push.
Forbes
Biden’s Regulatory Big Bang: A Parting Gift Trump Is Set To Return
Just as the incoming Trump administration promised to repeal “foolish” and “radical” Biden executive actions—and issue so many executive orders on day one…
Products
Free to Prosper: Regulatory reform and government efficiency
Products
Free to Prosper: Antitrust
Blog
Safeguarding innovation from bureaucracy: The techno-libertarian pivot
The just-concluded 2025 Consumer Electronics Show (CES) highlighted the relentless pace of technological innovation—from robotics and AI to rollable laptops and transparent TVs. Yet, amid…
Blog
Is Congress even trying? 3,248 new rules vs. 175 laws
In 2024, federal agencies issued 3,248 rules and regulations, while Congress enacted only 175 laws. I refer to the simple ratio—19 rules for…
Forbes
The 2025 Unconstitutionality Index: Exposing Congress’s Abdication Of Power
One of the themes of the incoming Trump administration is that federal administrative agencies, rather than the elected Congress, write most laws. This contradicts the…
Blog
Biden’s regulatory landscape: A year-end analysis
As we ring in 2025, the Federal Register reveals a noteworthy chapter in regulatory history under the Joe Biden administration. We take our traditional year-end look at it here. The 2024 Federal Register closed…
WSJ
‘Taxpocalypse’ Now
Joe Biden, Undisputed Champion Of course this item’s headline isn’t about presidential ethics, cognitive strength or fiscal management. But there is at least one category…
Blog
Charting a glide path to overturn Biden regulations in the 119th Congress
As the 119th Congress and incoming Trump administration prepare to govern, one key weapon in their arsenal will be the Congressional Review Act (CRA) of…
Forbes
Shutdowns Aren’t The Problem, They’re The Solution
Federal shutdowns—along with the debt limit like that the Republicans sought to extend in the American Relief Act (ARA)—may represent the last remaining…
The American Spectator
Regulations’ Enormous Costs and DOGE’s Enormous Upside
The American Spectator cited CEI’s Ten Thousand Commandments Wayne Crews, author of the Competitive Enterprise Institute’s “Ten Thousand Commandments” study, produced a price tag that…
Blog
Biden’s Fall 2024 Unified Agenda of regulations: The numbers, trends, and what’s next
The Biden administration’s Office of Management and Budget (OMB) dropped the Fall 2024 Unified Agenda of Federal Regulatory and Deregulatory Actions this past weekend.
Forbes
White House Releases Fall 2024 Unified Agenda Of Federal Regulatory And Deregulatory Actions
Federal departments and agencies have highlighted their rulemaking priorities in the (usually) twice yearly Unified Agenda of Federal Regulatory and Deregulatory Actions since the early 1980s. This…
Blog
Can Trump’s DOGE team outmaneuver regulatory dark matter?
As Donald Trump prepares for a second term, his administration inherits a far more expansive regulatory state than it did in 2017. As explored today…
Fox News
‘Gov’t knows best’: Biden admin breaks Obama record for filling Federal Register with most regulations
Fox News quoted CEI’s expert on Federal Register record “Federal Register page counts are a highly imperfect gauge of regulatory burden. Biden’s milestone,…
Blog
Biden breaks Federal Register record
Joe Biden’s administration has set a new Federal Register record with 96,088 pages as of December 3, 2024, surpassing the Obama administration’s 95,894 pages in…
Letters
Post-Chevron Suggestions for Congress
Dear 118th & 119th Congress,On June 28, 2024, in Loper Bright v. Raimondo, the United States Supreme Court overturned the 40-year-old Chevron doctrine, which granted…
Washington Examiner
Biden did it: Most regulation-filled Federal Register ever at 96,088 pages
Washington Examiner cited CEI’s expert on the final number of regulation pages in the Federal Register for Biden’s term Clyde Wayne Crews, the…
Blog
Fred Smith and the Hourglass of Market Evolution
Our much–loved CEI founder Fred L. Smith Jr. would often insist that we not refer merely to antitrust or antitrust policy, but…
Washington Examiner
DOGE target: Paperwork hits 10 billion hours, equals 15,000 lifetimes
Washington Examiner cited CEI’s expert on financial regulation “For periodic real-time assessments, the OMB maintains an online landing page for ‘Government-Wide Totals for Active Information…
Blog
From cuts to costs: Why federal paperwork keeps piling up
The Office of Management and Budget’s (OMB) release of the 2023 Information Collection Budget (ICB) paints a troubling picture of not just of growing federal…
Blog
Swamp things: Why DOGE moving Beltway agencies to states isn’t deregulation
The Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE), expected to be established by president-elect Trump and led by Elon Musk and Vivek Ramaswamy, aims to slash regulations,…
E&E News
EPA in Elon Musk’s crosshairs
E&E News cited CEI’s expert on the EPA’s future under DOGE Wayne Crews, a fellow of regulatory studies at the Competitive Enterprise Institute, a free market…
Washington Examiner
Biden’s swamp record: $1.8 trillion in regulations, 800x Trump
The Washington Examiner cited CEI’s experts on tracking regulation Besides breaking the cost burden on America with his regulations, Biden is on a path…
Blog
Biden’s regulatory report is in, but key costs remain in the shadows
The election is over and among much else, federal regulations are emerging front and center for the incoming administration. While the federal debt sits…
Blog
Biden’s 2024 Federal Register page count already second highest ever
We’ve not closed the Book of Regulation for 2024, Biden’s final calendar year in office, but we can mark a milestone nonetheless. The Federal Register…
Capitol Matters
Now, About Deregulation . . .
Capitol Matters cited CEI’s expert on regulatory disciplines Wayne Crews, writing in Forbes in September:…
Blog
A 2024 CEI HALLOWEEN SPECIAL: A new inventory unmasking federal agency guidance documents
In my new Halloween-themed article at Forbes, I explore the eerie expanse of federal agency guidance documents. We have to try to have a…
Washington Examiner
Biden poised to crash through regulations records
Washington Examiner cited CEI’s expert on Biden’s record number of regulations “We could potentially see ourselves crossing the threshold of a 100,000 page Federal…
Forbes
Darklore Depository 2024: A Halloween Inventory Of Federal Agency Guidance Documents
The U.S. Code archives federal laws. The 186,000-page Code of Federal Regulations is where rules from the daily Federal Register are embalmed. As spirits would have it,…
Forbes
Exposing Loopholes: How Federal Regulatory Oversight Laws Are Being Ignored
Passing new laws to reform and streamline the administrative state is important, and reformers consistently call for such oversight. But just as critical is ensuring that…
Blog
The compliance crisis: Unveiling the regulatory loopholes agencies love
While federal regulatory reform is critical, it’s equally important that existing oversight laws be followed. Unfortunately, many of these laws are routinely disregarded, with little…
Washington Examiner
Black voters warned that Harris vote-‘buying’ plan makes them dependent on government
CEI’s expert was cited by the Washington Examiner on ‘buying votes’ Deregulation expert Clyde Wayne Crews with the Competitive Enterprise Institute said her…
Blog
Kamala’s Opportunity Agenda for Black Men: Regulatory frameworks masquerading as economic help
Recent developments signal a troubling trend for America’s small businesses, one that could alter the nation’s entrepreneurial landscape in a big and detrimental way. The…
Blog
Next time, let’s try emergency powers that shrink government
As the nation deals with the aftermath of successive natural disasters, the need for a renewed debate on federal emergency powers is increasingly clear. While…
Forbes
Emergency Powers Can Reduce Rather Than Expand Government
With back-to-back natural weather disasters dominating headlines, the use of federal emergency powers has become a focal point. It’s important to recognize that these powers,…
Washington Examiner
Trump and GOP urged to follow model deregulator, Jimmy Carter
Washington Examiner cited CEI’s experts on deregulatory legacy Read more at the Washington Examiner…
Forbes
The Surprising Deregulation Legacy Of Jimmy Carter—And Why It Still Matters
In the Wall Street Journal, former Texas Sen. Phil Gramm shared a compelling account of how President Jimmy Carter—who turns 100 October 1—has not received …
Blog
Pen and phone power: How presidential documents are changing the rules
Presidential executive orders and directives have long played a pivotal role in shaping federal policies and regulations. As President Obama famously remarked in 2014, “I’ve…
Blog
Congress decides, not agencies: The significance of the REINvented REINS Act
It’s been repeated a million times that in our constitutional republic, lawmaking power belongs to Congress. But over the years, this authority has increasingly shifted…
News Release
Updated REINS Act introduced in Senate and House
Today, Senator Rand Paul (R–KY) and Representative Kat Cammack (R, FL-03) introduced an updated version of the REINS (Regulations from the Executive In Need of Scrutiny)…
Hoover Institution
Where the Candidates Stand on Regulation
The Hoover Institution cited CEI’s expert on regulatory burdens The US regulatory state is massive. Wayne Crews, the vice president for policy of the Competitive…
Epoch Times
Congress’ Post-Chevron Dilemma: Take Back Power From Agencies or Concede It for Good
Epoch Times cited CEI’s expert on excessive government regulation When federal regulatory expert Wayne Crews was asked recently what Congress should do about excessive government…
Blog
Scaling deregulation: Can Trump achieve a 10-for-1 rule elimination?
In a speech at the Economic Club of New York, Donald Trump pledged if re-elected to eliminate—not two rules for every one added as he…
Blog
Congress needs to fight the bureaucracy – and itself
After testifying before the House Committee on Administration in July on Congress in a Post-Chevron World, I received a series of Questions for…
Testimony
Responses to Questions for the Record House Committee on Administration
The hearing topic and questions for the record raise foundational issues concerning the legitimacy of lawmaking and the entities responsible for crafting those laws.
Blog
Congressional Review Act votes could claw back some of Biden’s regulations
As the Biden-Harris baton-passing administration approaches the final stretch of its first term, a critical deadline has passed that could render subsequent major federal rules…
Washington Examiner
Most ‘swamp’ managers say voters don’t matter
The Washington Examiner cited CEI’s experts on regulation decisions Clyde Wayne Crews, the regulation expert at the Competitive Enterprise Institute, told Secrets,…