Goodlatte, Bishop laud executive action to roll back unnecessary, costly regulations

U.S. Reps. Bob Goodlatte (R-VA) and Rob Bishop (R-UT) applauded President Trump signing an executive order on Friday that authorizes regulatory reform task forces within each federal agency with the goal of alleviating unnecessary regulations.

Goodlatte, the chairman of the House Judiciary Committee, said Americans have been asking Congress to “lift the burdens of red tape for years” and are seeing action under a unified Republican government.

“The executive order signed by President Trump calls for greater transparency and accountability of our federal agencies, which have turned into a runaway regulatory state,” Goodlatte said. “By holding our regulators accountable, we are ensuring that new regulations are made smarter, and not to the detriment of the American families and workers.”

Each agency will establish a regulatory reform task force to find ways to eliminate or modify regulations that curb job creation, are duplicative or are unnecessarily expensive.

“Already, the House has passed critical legislation to cut red tape, and it is reassuring that the Trump administration is doing what it can as we work to pass permanent legislation to fix our regulatory system for the benefit of the American people,” Goodlatte said.

Under the executive order, each agency will designate an official to serve as a regulatory reform officer to lead reviews of all agency regulations with cost, effectiveness, necessity and transparency in mind.

“This order represents the beginning of a vital paradigm shift to reduce the arbitrary decisions of bureaucrats in Washington and return decisions to people,” Bishop, the chairman of the House Natural Resources Committee, said.

“For far too long the size and scope of the federal government has grown as destructive regulations cascade from the executive branch with no accountability. Instead of acting alone in violation of the founder’s intent when they wrote the Constitution, I am hopeful this order ushers a new era of cooperation between bureaucrats and the people’s representatives in Congress,” Bishop said.