The Biden Administration’s Radical Regulatory Agenda - Diane Katz T

For the Biden Administration to assert that more regulation and even bigger government will “improve the lives of the American people” mocks the challenges facing the nation and betrays the fundamental principles of its Founding. [...] Otherwise, the Biden Administration’s radical regulatory agenda will reduce America to “nothing better than a flock of timid and industrious animals, of which the government is the shepherd.”8 By the Numbers The new Biden agenda lists 2,678 “active”9 regulatory actions, which exceeds by 35 percent the number of prospective rulemakings in the first fall agenda issued by the Trump Administration. [...] Indeed, at least 30 agenda actions are designated as inflicting “substantial direct effects on the States, on the relationship between the national government and the States, or on the distribution of power and responsibilities among the various levels of government.”15 Imbalance in the federal–state relationship has profound effects on self-government. [...] Bureau of Labor Statistics.31 Apparently not satisfied with encumbering the transportation and energy sectors, the White House is also preparing to regulate the financial sector to (supposedly) mitigate “climate-related risks.” For example, the agenda includes a proposal by the Securities and Exchange Commission to force issuers of public securities (stocks and bonds) to report on the risks that c. [...] To advance these goals, Congress should: l Codify President Ronald Reagan’s Executive Order 12612.40 The order directs departments and agencies to grant states the “maximum administrative discretion possible” and to limit state discretion “only where constitutional authority for the action is clear and certain and the national activity is necessitated by the presence of a problem of national scope.