Sponsors (5)
The bill clarifies and centralizes leadership, personnel, and publishing authorities at the Library, GPO, and Copyright Office to improve continuity and speed, but it shifts appointment power toward congressional leaders and reduces Senate checks—trading increased operational clarity and responsiveness for greater politicization risk, weakened oversight, and transitional costs.
Federal employees at the Library of Congress, the Government Publishing Office (GPO), and the Copyright Office gain clearer, codified appointment, removal, pay, and personnel rules that reduce ambiguity about who leads and how pay/appointments take effect, improving administrative continuity.
Candidates for Librarian, GPO Director, and Copyright Register are selected under merit- and fitness-focused rules (explicitly without regard to political affiliation), which can protect career staff from partisan hiring and reduce partisan coercion.
Defined succession and acting-appointment processes (including a 120-day requirement to fill Deputy posts and backup congressional recommendations) give Library and GPO employees faster, clearer continuity of leadership when vacancies or absences occur.
Congressional party leaders gain concentrated appointment and removal power for the Librarian and GPO Director and a formal role in filling acting officials, increasing the risk that leadership selections become politicized and subject to partisan control.
The bill removes or limits Senate advice-and-consent for principal appointments and enables appointments/acting service without Senate confirmation, weakening a key legislative check and reducing independent vetting of senior officials.
Acting officials appointed under the new processes are permitted to exercise full authority (including major delegations and decisions) without Senate confirmation, creating risk that significant policy or procurement choices could be made by temporary, non‑confirmed appointees.
Based on analysis of 11 sections of legislative text.
Reorganizes appointment and succession rules for the Librarian and GPO, creates deputies, makes the Copyright Office independent, brings GPO under workplace laws, and allows GPO to provide publishing services.
Official title: To modify the appointment and removal process for certain legislative branch officers, and for other purposes.
Introduced November 12, 2025 by H. Morgan Griffith · Last progress June 9, 2026
Revises how several legislative-branch agencies are led and governed by changing appointment and removal procedures, creating deputy positions, and shifting authorities. It makes the Copyright Office independent of the Librarian of Congress, moves the Government Publishing Office (GPO) head from Presidential appointment to a congressional appointment process, requires new human-capital rules at GPO, and brings GPO within the Congressional Accountability Act. The bill also updates succession and acting-officer rules for the Librarian and GPO, establishes deputy roles and timelines for filling vacancies, creates an Office of Inspector General for the Copyright Office, and changes the statutory requirement that all federal printing be done at GPO into a permissive authorization for GPO to provide printing and publishing services. Most provisions take effect on enactment but several appointment, pay, and transition provisions have delayed or conditional effective dates.