Sponsor
Richard Lynn Scott
Senator · R-FL
Senator · R-FL
Official title: Amend chapter 6 of title 5, United States Code (commonly known as the "Regulatory Flexibility Act"), to ensure complete analysis of potential impacts on small entities of rules, and for other purposes.
Introduced July 30, 2026 by Richard Lynn Scott · Last progress July 30, 2026
The bill substantially strengthens SBA advocacy, transparency, and procedural protections for small entities—potentially lowering compliance costs for many small businesses—at the cost of increased agency workloads, taxpayer expense, slower rulemaking, more litigation, and some risk of weakening broader public‑interest protections.
Small-business owners gain a stronger, centralized advocate: the SBA Chief Counsel and Office of Advocacy get expanded powers to review, comment on, and formally intervene in rulemaking and final rules, increasing SBA influence over how rules affect small firms.
Small-business owners get clearer, faster, and more accessible information: agencies must produce plain‑language guides, 3‑business‑day summaries, NAICS identifications, and publish full final analyses, improving transparency and compliance readiness.
Small-business owners face reduced compliance costs in many cases: first‑time paperwork violations can avoid fines with short cure periods and agencies must assess less‑harmful alternatives and potential rule rescissions, which can lower financial and administrative burdens.
Federal agencies, taxpayers, and regulated businesses face substantially higher administrative and analytic burdens: new review processes, plain‑language guides, rapid summaries, economic quantification requirements, and reporting will increase staff time, slow rulemaking, and raise government costs.
Regulated parties and agencies will likely face more litigation and legal costs: expanded intervention rights for the Chief Counsel and SBA Office of Advocacy, plus concentrated post‑publication triggers, can increase procedural challenges and courtroom activity.
The public (including workers and consumers) could face weakened health, safety, or other public‑interest protections if agencies are constrained to prioritize minimizing small‑entity impacts or if cure periods and waivers reduce deterrence for harmful violations.
Based on analysis of 14 sections of legislative text.
Strengthens SBA Office of Advocacy powers, tightens and quantifies regulatory‑flexibility analyses, mandates plain‑language guides and web posting, adds SBA review panels, and limits first‑time small‑business paperwork fines.
Gives the SBA Chief Counsel for Advocacy expanded authority to set and approve small‑business size standards used by other statutes, increases the Office of Advocacy's ability to review and intervene in agency rulemaking and litigation, and strengthens requirements for regulatory flexibility analyses and agency outreach about small‑entity impacts. It also requires agencies to use plain language guides for small entities, creates timelines and procedures for SBA review of economically significant rules affecting small entities, centralizes Chief Counsel rulemaking authority, and limits first‑time civil fines for small businesses related to federal paperwork collection in most cases. The bill adds new analytical, transparency, and procedural duties across the Regulatory Flexibility Act framework: longer and more detailed economic-impact analyses, web posting and plain-language summary requirements, periodic review plans for rules that significantly affect many small entities, and enhanced opportunity for the SBA Office of Advocacy to participate in agency processes and litigation. It includes short deadlines for an immediate GAO capacity study and for the Chief Counsel to issue implementing rules, but does not create direct new spending authorizations or tax changes in the text provided.