In the 2024 election cycle, the Republican Party secured control of the White House, Senate, and House of Representatives, which is likely to have profound impact on environmental regulatory policy in years to come. After an unprecedented regulatory barrage from the Biden administration (an estimated 1.7 trillion dollars in new regulatory costs over the past four years), the new Trump administration is expected to focus on a comprehensive deregulatory strategy to remove some of these regulatory burdens. 

Some of the environmental issues that will be addressed include: finding ways to promote domestic oil and gas production, reducing regulatory burdens and air emission control requirements for U.S. manufacturing, and stopping implementation of programs that provide credits for electric vehicles, clean energy, energy efficiency mandates, and other climate change efforts. President-elect Trump has nominated former Congressman Lee Zeldin to head the Environmental Protection Agency and to be the primary architect of the new direction for environmental regulatory policy. Zeldin has promised to restore U.S. energy dominance and revitalize U.S. manufacturing by bring back American jobs, while continuing to provide access to clean air and water.

To implement the regulatory rollback, Trump will have several tools at his disposal, including Executive Orders, the Congressional Review Act, the appropriations and budget process, new rulemakings, and litigation strategy.
Executive Orders. On Day 1 one of the new administration, President Trump is expected to issue several Executive Orders to address a broad array of issues, including: immigration, trade policy, consumer protection, health issues, government efficiency, and regulatory burdens. For example, an Executive Order could be used to form the new Department of Government Efficiency that could be responsible for identifying ways to eliminate government waste and over-regulation. In addition, there are likely to be Executive Orders reversing several of the Executive Orders issued by President Biden. President Trump may also rely on other executive actions such as a “Regulatory Freeze” memorandum that typically stops the implementation of newly promulgated regulations to give the new administration an opportunity to review the impact of the regulations. 

Congressional Review Act (CRA). The CRA enables Congress with a simple majority vote in both chambers to nullify final rules that were issued in the later part of the Biden administration. In addition, for regulations nullified by the CRA, federal agencies are prevented from issuing “substantially similar” rules. There are estimated to be approximately 800 rules (nearly 10% of them are environmental regulations) that could be subject to the CRA. Because Congress must review regulations individually, it is likely that Congress would concentrate on only the most significant regulations in using the authority of the CRA to nullify selected regulations.

Appropriations and Budget. Congress could use the appropriations process to deny federal agencies funding to implement a regulatory program or specific regulatory requirements. For example, Congress could cut funding for an EPA regulatory program such that the program office would no longer have the resources to implement an air emissions regulatory program.

New Regulations. The Trump administration could rescind existing regulations and issue new regulations to replace them. This would require a notice and comment rulemaking and could typically take at least two years to implement. In addition, with the overturning of the “Chevron doctrine” that granted agencies wide discretion in promulgating regulations, EPA, for example, would have to demonstrate that it has statutory authority to issue the new regulation and that it has provided adequate justification in the rulemaking process to support the new regulation. Furthermore, some regulations must be promulgated because they are mandated by consent orders or existing statutory obligations. Finally, many states that would be opposed to federal deregulatory initiatives, could develop new regulations to replace some of the regulations removed by the Trump administration.

 Litigation Strategy. For those regulations that are currently subject to judicial review, the Trump administration could request a stay of the litigation and a voluntary remand of the rule. For example, Trump’s Department of Justice (whose head is responsible for defending regulations) could request a stay of the legal challenge of the final fine particulate (PM2.5) National Ambient Air Quality Standard, and ask for a voluntary remand of the rule to EPA to review and reissue a new regulation that, presumably, would be less stringent and impose a reduced regulatory burden on metalcasting operations and other manufacturing operations.

The new Trump administration has indicated that it intends to promote a deregulatory agenda and has several procedural tools to implement it––both short-term and long-term options. The regulatory rollback is not automatic, would not be applicable to all regulations, and would be subject to applicable legal requirements for new regulations. What we do know, is that in the Trump administration, regulations will not be issued at the unprecedented rate of the previous administration. The AFS Washington Office will continue work with government officials and industry stakeholders to represent the best interests of the metalcasting industry to minimize regulatory burdens.