GW Regulatory Studies Podcast

Policy analysts Matias Vesperoni and Finn Dobkin share key takeaways of the new Regulators’ Budget report. The latest edition covers fiscal years 1960 through 2024 and presents data extracted from the Budget of the United States on the outlays and personnel devoted to writing, administering, and enforcing federal regulations at 77 departments and agencies. The Regulators’ Budget offers insights in...

Previously considered largely a tool for the incoming Congress and president to overturn a departing president’s midnight regulations, Congress has recently begun using the CRA in unanticipated ways. Professors Susan Dudley and Steven Balla discuss new approaches and implications for the future. Read full commentary .

Hoover Institution Research Fellow Patrick McLaughlin discusses how the driving force behind safety improvements in the freight rail industry is capital investment, not minimum staffing requirements.

While the public comment process may be in need of sensible reform, some current efforts arguably go beyond constructive changes and threaten to fundamentally alter longstanding practices which support good governance. Political scientists Steven Balla and Adriana Bunea discuss how governments on both sides of the Atlantic have recently taken steps to limit opportunities for public comment during...

Will Yeatman   is a lawyer specializing in administrative law and regulatory policy. He recently joined the RSC team as research professor and deputy director.

Looking back at the important developments from the previous year, our team highlights nine themes from a time of unprecedented change in regulation activity and practice. Policy analysts Finn Dobkin and Matias Vesperoni and research specialists Tambudzai Gundani and Henry Hirsch drill down into the details and discuss the impacts they expect these policy changes to have going forward. Read the fu...

Former US Senator Phil Gramm and George Mason University economics professor Donald Boudreaux share lessons gleaned from their new book—a work notable for its approach to framing, interrogating and debunking common myths about capitalism. In conversation with Professor Susan Dudley, the authors explored the transformative power of free markets through major historical developments including the In...

Tech policy expert and researcher Tambudzai Gundani discusses how efforts to adopt a state-level moratorium against policies regulating artificial intelligence (AI) would help ensure consistency, prevent legal fragmentation, and allow Congress time to develop a comprehensive national framework. Read Gundani's full commentary at our website .

Senior Policy Analyst Finn Dobkin discusses rulemaking authority of the Council on Environmental Quality and coordination across federal agencies to disclose environmental impacts of development projects. Without interagency and intergovernmental cooperation under the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA), environmental outcomes will suffer. Read Finn's essay at The Regulatory Review .

Policy Analyst Sarah Hay discusses the Congressional Review Act and actions taken by the 119th Congress to exercise its oversight of regulations from the prior administration. Important differences are compared to the 115th Congress's use of CRA during the last presidential transition year. Read Sarah's commentary at our website .

Visiting Scholar and economist Mary Sullivan shares insights from her recent public comment submitted in response to the Anticompetitive Regulations Task Force of the Department of Justice. Sullivan made recommendations for keeping a level playing field between large and small businesses through the use of a tiered adjustment to compliance burdens based on company size. Read the full text of Mary&...

Susan Dudley recaps the regulatory actions taken during the early weeks of the second Trump term. Milestones include a pause to all rulemakings in progress, a delay of effective dates, and rescinding Biden's guidance to agencies for conducting regulatory impact analysis. Going forward, Dudley expects a slowdown in the number of rulemakings but the process will continue to be central to the adm...

Our policy analysts discuss ten important trends that defined the regulatory landscape over the past year. With Zhoudan (Zoey) Xie, Sarah Hay, Finn Dobkin & Henry Hirsch. Read the full commentary .

As policymakers debate how best to harness the potential of artificial intelligence while fostering competition and safety, there are lessons to be learned from the regulatory approaches to novel technologies of the past. In this special, AI-generated episode powered by Google NotebookLM, the platform summarizes an essay by Susan Dudley with insights on the regulatory frameworks developed for tech...

Susan Dudley discusses the strategies and approaches the Trump administration is likely to use to advance goals of deregulation, such as reducing wasteful spending, reviving a regulatory budget, recalling some Biden rules through the Congressional Review Act, accelerating energy and infrastructure permitting, and more.

President-elect Donald Trump has pledged to revoke many Biden administration policies upon returning to the White House in January 2025. Poised to have GOP majorities in the US House and Senate, the new administration has the opportunity to fast-track its reversal of Biden-era regulations using the Congressional Review Act. Our policy experts Zoey Xie, Sarah Hay, and Steve Balla discuss which regu...

Following up on our recent forum event, Regulation by Enforcement: Blockchain and Crypto – Coin Center Policy Counsel and veteran Capitol Hill lawyer Landon Zinda returns for a deeper dive into cryptocurrency basics. Landon discusses the functionality of crypto tokens beyond digital payments, how crypto markets are evolving, and the current state of play for potential legislation and regulation of...

In April 2024, federal agencies broke records by issuing an unprecedented number of significant final rules. The surge of rules is related to the expectation that rules finalized later in the year may be at risk of being overturned through the Congressional Review Act. Senior Policy Analyst Zoey Xie and Senior Scholar Susan Dudley discuss the growing awareness and prominence of the CRA and the not...

President Biden’s Executive Order 14117 is an ambitious attempt to mitigate the exploitation of sensitive U.S. data. While the order’s implementation faces uncertainty in an election year, its approach is more tailored to producing meaningful protections on data security than the recent legislation banning TikTok. Senior Policy Analyst Mark Febrizio discusses the importance of addressing data secu...

Will History Repeat Itself? Forecasting CRA Use in a Second Trump Administration If Donald Trump is reelected to another presidential term in November 2024, efforts to continue his de-regulatory agenda are sure to follow. Regulations can be challenged on several fronts, and the Congressional Review Act (CRA) is an increasingly important tool that could be used following a change of administration....

Director of the GW Regulatory Studies Center Roger Nober shares perspectives from his recent public comment to the EPA regarding California State Nonroad Engine Pollution Control Standards for In-Use Locomotive Regulation. Nober draws from his extensive career in transportation policy and regulation to call for a rejection of the California emissions plan. Federal preemption is key to interstate c...

Director of the GW Regulatory Studies Center Roger Nober discusses the implications that new limitations on the longstanding Chevron Deference doctrine would have for federal agencies and regulatory rulemaking. Nober contends that the rhetoric around Chevron is overblown. The likely outcome of new limitations on Chevron would be a phase of regulation by adjudication as agencies adapt to build on t...

Professor Steve Balla discusses a new legislative proposal which aims to implement recommendations of the Administrative Conference of the United States to better handle mass campaigns and computer-generated inputs in the public commenting process. The Comment Integrity and Management Act promotes best practices in commenting at federal agencies and directs further study on the impacts of mass cam...

Policy analyst Sarah Hay dives into the Congressional Review Act (CRA), explaining its role in regulatory oversight by Congress. Hay unpacks the mechanics & usage, addresses common misconceptions, and sheds light on how Congress has used the CRA over time since its introduction in 1996. Read the full commentary online .

Last year was especially action-packed for watchers of federal regulation. Take a look back at major trends of 2023 with analysts Zhoudan (Zoey) Xie , Mark Febrizio and Sarah Hay as they share their perspectives on developments including artificial intelligence, greenhouse gas emissions, immigration, an overhaul of regulatory impact analysis, and much more. Read the full commentary and find previo...