|
|
|
|
| |
Hot off an Inauguration Day flush with tech billionaires, President Donald Trump dove straight into the job by signing a vertiginous amount of executive orders. He made history his first day back in office, issuing 46 presidential actions in total, if you’re keeping score at home.
So begins Trump’s quest of unraveling Biden-era regulations, including undoing Biden’s order to safeguard against risks posed by artificial intelligence. (I’ve seen The Terminator. What could go wrong?) And scrapping the electric vehicle mandate, which set a target for EVs to comprise half of the new-car market by 2030.
Trump also reversed course on diversity, equity, and inclusion within the federal government, implemented a hiring freeze, and is calling the full federal workforce back into the office. He paused the law banning TikTok unless its ownership changes, one that, mind you, he had sought out himself during his first term.
While some orders are descended with an iron fist, others might be no more than performance. Such might be the case with Trump's measure to deliver "emergency price relief” for American families. The order, which is relatively skimpy on details, offers more in platitudes than policy. Republicans might also want to refer to Gerald Ford’s “Whip Inflation Now” catastrophe in 1974.
The measure directs agency heads to tease out the notion of lowering housing costs (a page straight from the Biden administration’s playbook), and eliminate climate policies that Trump alleges are increasing food and fuel costs. The order fails to specify how the administration would drop the high cost of homes or which climate policies are the purported culprits here. (Here’s a thought: Maybe climate change is the actual cost driver.)
High prices remain one of the biggest issues. Sure, inflation dropped dramatically under the Biden administration, but prices remain painful for American pocketbooks. You walk into a Starbucks for a coffee and exit with a wallet that’s $7 lighter.
And Trump’s own policies could push prices higher, the very thorn that cost Democrats the election. Many experts have argued that his promise to hike tariffs—essentially a tax on consumers—is inflationary in itself.
Trump isn’t likely to let reality interfere with his momentum. As soon as tomorrow, a Clinton-era law known as the Congressional Review Act will allow lawmakers to clamp down on other Biden-era rules finalized within the past five months (August 16 is the firm date).
Public Citizen is tracking some rules that may take direct hits, one being the Federal Trade Commission's ban of fake customer reviews. There are also two listed there from the Small Business Administration: one that requires lenders to hang onto their Paycheck Protection Program records for 10 years and another that streamlined the application process within the 504 loan program.
The CRA "gives Congress a shortcut to kill regulations that protect the public," says Elizabeth Skerry, a regulatory policy associate at Public Citizen, "and because of this, the CRA is ripe for use by corporate special interests. That's exactly what we saw happen under the first Trump administration." That said, Congress is the one that has the power to create the framework in which federal agencies ink out regulations. And Republicans are exercising it.
---
|
|
|
|
|
|
| |
| Immigration upheaval: The country's worker shortage could dramatically worsen with Trump's immigration-related executive orders, with the restaurant and construction industries getting decimated. Business owners can expect an increase in audits and raids from enforcement agencies. |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
| |
 |
|
This administration has promised a substantial increase in the number of audits, which could result in fines, termination of employees who are not authorized to work, and, in rare cases, criminal prosecution of employers if they have been engaging in a pattern and practice of employing undocumented workers.
–Becki L. Young, co-founder of Grossman Young & Hammond |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
| |
| Eye on Washington: More confirmation hearings are on tap this week as Trump fills out his cabinet, though one pick is noticeably absent from the docket thus far. That would be the proposed lead for the Department of Health and Human Services, Robert F. Kennedy Jr. |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
| |
| Parting shot: SBA Administrator Isabel Casillas Guzman’s tenure is now over, and she tells me that electing to downsize the SBA, a billion-dollar agency, would be a mistake. |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
| |
| Keeping up: Here’s what else I’m reading at Inc. |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
