Rewriting the Rules
Loading...
Serial Number
Levin Center Identifier
Document Date
2002-10-24
Report Length
90 pages
Policy Agendas Project Major Code
Policy Agendas Project Minor Code
Additional, Minority, Dissenting Views
Report Type
Found Using Methodology
Yes
Committee(s)
Subcommittee(s)
Commission(s)
Idependent Author(s)
Brief Executive Summary
The Majority Staff of the Senate Committee on Governmental Affairs reported on the order from President Bush's Chief of Staff Andrew Card to freeze the Federal regulatory process on the President's inauguration day. Senator Joseph I. Lieberman directed his staff to review the Card memo and its effect on three rules that were considered final before the memo: the Department of Agriculture’s rule conserving roadless areas in national forests, the Department of the Interior’s (DOI) rule regulating hard rock mining on public lands, and the Environmental Protection Agency’s rule capping the permissible level of arsenic in drinking water. The report found that the Bush administration weakened the first two rules, and caused months of delay in implementing the third, despite the extensive public comment and scrutiny the rules had already gone through. Ultimately the Majority Staff of the committee concluded that: "implementation of the Card memo was of questionable legality and gave an early warning of the administration’s lack of respect for the process of developing regulations, including those providing a variety of important environmental and public protections."