Regulations
The rules, and the rollback
Federal regulations are how laws on clean air, safe food, fair lending, and safe workplaces actually get applied. Since 2025 the machinery has run in reverse: the fewest new rules of any year since at least 1993, a record number of rules erased by Congress, dozens of protections repealed or dropped, and the firing of the commissioners who run independent regulators, which the Supreme Court then allowed. Some of it is the stated goal (cheaper cars and power, less paperwork); some of it the government's own estimates count in illnesses and deaths.
New federal rules per year
Final rules published in the Federal Register, 1993–2025, and 2026 through September 28 (lighter). Most are routine; the count has drifted down for decades under both parties, and fell hardest in 2017 and 2025.
The big rules
“Economically significant” final rules (roughly, $100M+ a year in effects) by presidential year, February to January (George Washington University Regulatory Studies Center). Spikes at the end of each term are “midnight rules” rushed out before a handoff.
The 2017 count (22) is the lowest in the series; 2025 had 42. The 2026 figure covers February to June only.
Rules erased by Congress
Regulations overturned under the Congressional Review Act (1996), which lets a new Congress and president cancel recent rules by simple majority and bars the agency from issuing a new rule that is “substantially the same.”
What Congress erased in 2025–26
| Signed | Rule overturned | Law |
|---|---|---|
| Mar 14, 2025 | EPA methane “waste emissions charge” on oil and gas | P.L. 119-2 |
| Mar 14, 2025 | Bureau of Ocean Energy Management rule on protecting marine archaeological resources | P.L. 119-3 |
| Apr 10, 2025 | IRS broker reporting for decentralized crypto exchanges | P.L. 119-5 |
| May 9, 2025 | Four Energy Department appliance and equipment efficiency standards | P.L. 119-6 to 119-9 |
| May 9, 2025 | CFPB overdraft fee rule (cap of $5, or at cost, for large banks) | P.L. 119-10 |
| May 9, 2025 | CFPB supervision of large digital payment apps | P.L. 119-11 |
| May 23, 2025 | EPA hazardous air pollutant standard for tire manufacturing, and a Glen Canyon vehicle rule | P.L. 119-13, 119-14 |
| Jun 12, 2025 | California's waivers for clean cars, clean trucks, and low-NOx engines | P.L. 119-15 to 119-17 |
| Jun 20, 2025 | OCC bank-merger policy; EPA “once in, always in” major-source rule | P.L. 119-19, 119-20 |
| Dec 2025 | Six federal land-management plans in Alaska, Montana, North Dakota, and Wyoming | P.L. 119-47 to 119-52 |
| Apr 27, 2026 | Boundary Waters mining withdrawal (Minnesota) | P.L. 119-85 |
Critics note several 2025 uses stretched the law: California's vehicle waivers were treated as “rules” over the objections of GAO and the Senate parliamentarian, and Congress reached back to public-land plans issued as early as 2022 once GAO determined that those plans were rules.
Protections rolled back
26 major protections repealed, dropped, or stalled since 2025, area by area, with the government's own estimates of what they prevented and where courts stepped in.
View →The independent regulators
Commissioners fired at the FTC, NLRB, CPSC, EEOC, and more; boards left without a quorum for months; and the Supreme Court ruling that made it legal.
View →Related charts
The deregulation ledger · EPA enforcement by president · Consumer-protection enforcement · OSHA inspectors · Food safety · Inspectors general removed · Who watched the bailouts