There are two main areas in which Congress can enact meaningful reform. The first is to rein in regulatory guidance documents, which we refer to as “regulatory dark matter,” whereby agencies regulate through Federal Register notices, guidance documents, and other means outside standard rulemaking procedure. The second is to enact a series of reforms to increase agency transparency and accountability of all regulation and guidance. These include annual regulatory report cards for rulemaking agencies and regulatory cost estimates from the Office of Management and Budget for more than just a small subset of rules.
In 2019, President Trump signed two executive orders aimed at stopping the practice of agencies using guidance documents to effectively implement policy without going through the legally required notice and comment process.
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Agenda for Congress: Regulation
CEI’s new Agenda for Congress is out now. Each chapter contains pro-market policy recommendations in areas where CEI has expertise. Here are four principles…

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This week in ridiculous regulations: Automatic brakes and horse protection amendments
Sixty-seven people died when a military helicopter and a passenger jet collided near Reagan Airport. President Trump issued an Executive Order to stop all federal…

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Free the Economy podcast: Trump vs. the Regulatory State with Susan Dudley
In this week’s episode we cover how the feds are forcing your bank to spy on you, a new strategy for housing…
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Study
Washington Antitrust Report
View Full Document as PDF Antitrust reform is in serious trouble. The Administration’s efforts to legislate…
Washington Post
Antitrust Act May Undergo Major Changes
Op-Eds
An Antitrust Route to Re-regulation
From telecommunications to airlines and railroads, from banking to natural gas, from trucking to broadcasting, partial deregulation has changed the U.S. economic landscape for…
Op-Eds
Taxpayers Tied to the Tracks
Full article available in pdf. In the latest episode of the Perils of Pauline, the villain, (a.k.a., Amtrak—the most heavily subsidized…
Staff & Scholars

Clyde Wayne Crews
Fred L. Smith Fellow in Regulatory Studies
- Business and Government
- Consumer Freedom
- Deregulation

Ryan Young
Senior Economist
- Antitrust
- Business and Government
- Regulatory Reform

Fred L. Smith, Jr.
Founder; Chairman Emeritus
- Automobiles and Roads
- Aviation
- Business and Government

Sam Kazman
Counsel Emeritus
- Antitrust
- Automobiles and Roads
- Banking and Finance

Marlo Lewis, Jr.
Senior Fellow
- Climate
- Energy
- Energy and Environment