Trump 'Two-for-One' Regulatory Order Exceeds Constitutional Authority, Lawsuit Says
President Donald Trump’s Jan. 30 executive order requiring federal agencies to kill two regulations for every new one issued (see 1701300037) was challenged in court Feb. 8 when the Natural Resources Defense Council and other groups sued the administration for a declaratory judgment that the order exceeds Trump’s constitutional authority. Trump’s order “will block or force the repeal of regulations needed to protect health, safety, and the environment,” said the complaint in U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia by NRDC, Public Citizen and the Communications Workers of America (here). "The plaintiffs are asking the court to issue a declaration that the order cannot be lawfully implemented and bar the agencies from implementing the order," a news release said (here).
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The directive that federal agencies “zero out costs to regulated industries, while entirely ignoring benefits to the Americans whom Congress enacted these statutes to protect, will force agencies to take regulatory actions that harm the people of this nation,” the complaint said. Directing agencies to kill two regulations for every new one issued, “based solely on a directive to impose zero net costs and without any consideration of benefits, is arbitrary, capricious, an abuse of discretion, and not in accordance with law,” the complaint said. “No governing statute” authorizes an agency to withhold a public-safety regulation “on the basis of an arbitrary upper limit on total costs,” it said.
The order seeks to impose rulemaking requirements “beyond and in conflict with” the requirements of the Administrative Procedure Act “and the statutes from which the federal agencies derive their rulemaking authority,” the complaint said. It exceeds the president’s authority under the Constitution, “usurps” the legislative authority of Congress and violates the president’s constitutional oath to be sure that U.S. laws are “faithfully executed,” it said. Regulatory protections “do impose costs on regulated industry, but almost never as much as industry alleges,” the plaintiff groups said in a separate explainer on the suit (here). The White House didn’t comment.