Sponsors (3)
The bill increases congressional control, oversight, and public transparency over federal rules and can reduce long-standing regulatory burdens, but it heightens risks of lapses in protections, legal and operational uncertainty, and politicized central review that could hamper agencies’ responsiveness.
Taxpayers and small businesses face fewer long-standing federal regulations automatically in force because many rules will expire after five years unless reauthorized, potentially lowering regulatory burdens and compliance costs.
Congress, taxpayers, and federal employees gain stronger oversight and transparency: agencies must provide timely written justifications, consolidate reauthorization requests, and post reports publicly, making legislative control and the rationale for keeping rules clearer.
Specifying OIRA leadership and statutory definitions clarifies which offices and rules the Act covers, reducing implementation ambiguity for agencies and the public.
Consumers and the public could lose safety, environmental, or consumer protections when rules automatically expire if Congress does not reauthorize them, creating direct health and safety risks.
Small businesses, state governments, and regulated entities face legal uncertainty and operational disruption if Congress fails to reauthorize rules on time, producing gaps in regulation and compliance confusion.
Agencies’ ability to promptly update or revise rules is constrained (they cannot revise or reissue sunset rules between congressional sessions), reducing responsiveness to emerging risks and potentially harming national security or public protection efforts.
Based on analysis of 5 sections of legislative text.
Requires most new federal agency rules to automatically expire five years after their effective date unless Congress explicitly reauthorizes them. Agencies must submit a written reauthorization request to Congress at least one year before a rule’s scheduled sunset, and OMB or the agency head may oversee the sunset process. The Act preserves existing Administrative Procedure Act procedures and excludes certain rule types (e.g., criminal-enforcement rules, national security or emergency rules, internal management rules, and rules issued via formal adjudication) from the sunset requirement. The law shifts the default balance of regulatory authority by turning rule permanence into an affirmative congressional choice: agencies can issue rules, but those rules will lapse unless Congress acts to keep them in force. It also adds reporting and public-posting requirements for reauthorization requests.
Most new agency rules automatically expire after five years unless Congress reauthorizes them; agencies must request reauthorization one year before sunset.
Official title: To sunset new Federal regulatory rules after 5 years, and for other purposes.
Introduced February 12, 2025 by Marlin A. Stutzman · Last progress February 12, 2025