Trump ramps up war on regulations with 702 cuts in pipeline

WASHINGTON – The Trump administration is stepping up its efforts to cut red tape across the federal government, releasing a regulatory plan that would eliminate 702 existing administrative rules.

The reductions published on July 3 set a record for the number of deregulatory actions under consideration in a White House semiannual agenda plan. It is also about twice as many as were in motion at any given time in Donald Trump’s first presidency, and comes on top of 752 such regulatory rollbacks finalised or completed since the start of the federal government’s current fiscal year that began on Oct 1, 2025.  

Among the measures that the administration plans to scrap by the end of the fiscal year in September: environmental review requirements for energy projects, energy efficiency standards and rules that promote diversity, equity and inclusion. 

In total, the administration projects US$1.5 trillion (S$1.94 trillion) in savings for the economy through all the regulations it plans to have terminated by end of September.

The lion’s share of the expected savings stems from a single action underpinning the climate policies of Presidents Barack Obama and Joe Biden, repealing the 2009 “endangerment finding” that greenhouse gases pose a threat to human health and welfare. Trump has claimed that the emissions policies made possible by that finding would cost the economy US$1.3 trillion. 

Liberal groups have disputed the administration’s projected savings from the rules reductions, however, arguing that the analysis does not fully account for the benefits of environmental, safety and consumer protection regulations.

The plan is only the second such agenda the White House has published so far in Trump’s second term, after the administration skipping the release in the fall of 2025. It also includes the work of dozens of agencies that formerly enacted and enforced rules independently of the White House. 

On June 29, the US Supreme Court upended that independence by ruling that the President has the power to remove those agency heads at will. Now, those agencies are required to coordinate their regulations with the Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs, part of the White House budget office.

The White House invoked the Declaration of Independence in releasing the report on a federal holiday to observe the nation’s birthday. 

“President Trump is improving the American people’s lives beyond economic cost savings. The federal government has imposed onerous restrictions on everything from the cars that Americans may drive to the appliances that they can use in their homes,” wrote Mark Paoletta, who is acting as the administration’s top regulator.

In one of his first executive orders since returning to office, Trump directed agencies to repeal 10 regulations for every new measure. A White House official said the regulatory plan expected to meet that goal in 2026, but a full accounting of final actions would not be available until after the end of the fiscal year.

Many of the new steps are prompted by the One Big Beautiful Bill that Trump signed in 2025. The Treasury Department is considering rules on the taxation of college endowments and changes to treatment of research and development costs, bonus depreciation and caps on business interest deductions.

The Equal Employment Opportunity Commission is moving to scrap a longstanding “disparate impact” standard in proving racial discrimination. And the Food and Drug Administration is delaying its plans to regulate food packaging to require more visible nutrient data. 

But the administration is proposing a number of new regulations in the plan, including