Sponsors (2)
Official title: Improve agency rulemaking, and for other purposes.
Introduced May 12, 2025 by James Lankford · Last progress May 12, 2025
The bill increases clarity, transparency, and centralized review to make rulemaking more predictable and accountable for agencies and regulated parties, but at the cost of slower rule issuance, greater administrative burdens, reduced agency flexibility, and narrower judicial remedies that could weaken protections for vulnerable groups.
Businesses, state governments, and federal agencies get clearer statutory definitions and a $100 million "major rule" threshold, making regulatory status and planning more predictable.
Taxpayers and regulated parties gain greater transparency and oversight because agencies must analyze alternatives, publish underlying studies/models, provide longer comment periods, publish implementation timetables, and perform centralized retrospective assessments with OIRA reporting.
Courts and litigants get clearer review rules—courts will consider the full administrative record, decide legal questions de novo where specified, and a statutory definition of "substantial evidence" reduces ambiguity in administrative review.
The public, workers, and consumers could face delays in health, safety, and environmental protections because added procedural steps and centralized OIRA review will slow issuance of new rules.
State governments and businesses will lose flexibility and speed to get informal clarifications because statutory labeling and centralized classification of "guidance" and "major guidance" limits agencies' ability to issue quick policy clarifications.
Agencies—especially smaller ones—will face higher administrative burdens and compliance costs to perform expanded analyses, publish materials, meet docketing and reporting deadlines, and respond to retrospective-review requirements.
Based on analysis of 9 sections of legislative text.
Raises procedural requirements and OIRA oversight for federal rulemaking, mandates retrospective review of major rules, and tightens judicial review of agency actions.
Creates a new, detailed regulatory process that raises procedural requirements for federal rulemaking, expands Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs (OIRA) oversight of proposed and existing major rules, requires retrospective assessments of major rules, and changes how courts review agency action and guidance. It defines new statutory terms (including "guidance," "major guidance," and a $100,000,000 numeric test for "major rule"), requires agencies to evaluate a set list of alternatives and analyses before proposing major rules, and narrows the scope and standards of judicial review for certain agency actions. The Act also updates cross-references in several statutes, preserves existing copyright rights, and makes its rulemaking changes prospective only (not applying to rulemakings pending or completed at enactment). Overall it increases centralized review and documentation requirements for rulemaking while constraining how courts evaluate agency interpretations and some OIRA actions.