Congressional Review Act Targets in the 119th Congress
Biden Administration Rules at Risk of Repeal
The rules listed below are the most likely targets for Congressional Review Act (CRA) resolutions of disapproval in the 119th Congress beginning in January 2025.
Under the CRA, both chambers of Congress, by a simple majority vote with no possibility of a filibuster, can overturn regulations recently issued by a federal agency. If both the House and the Senate pass a resolution of disapproval and the president signs it, the regulation is overturned and has no effect.
Crucially, the CRA also includes a lookback period. Rules published in the final months of an outgoing presidential administration may be targeted for repeal via expedited procedures by the next Congress. The CRA lookback period began on August 16, 2024, meaning rules issued on or after August 16 could be subject to the CRA and are at risk of being overturned in the 119th Congress.
The rules below fall into one of two categories: 1) They were finalized during the lookback period and are most likely to be targeted by the Republican majority, or 2) They would likely be targeted by the CRA if finalized before the end of President Biden’s term. NOTE: This tracker is not a complete list of every rule that has been finalized since August 16, 2024 but rather reflects Public Citizen’s analysis of rules that fall within that period and are most likely to be vulnerable to CRA attack in the new Congress. To read more about the methodology for this tracker, click here.
Out of the many rules published in the final months of the Biden administration, the rules included in this list are the ones Public Citizen has determined are most likely to be targeted by corporate special interests in the 119th Congress due to the content of their regulation. For example, this tracker includes common-sense regulations that would protect ordinary Americans from harms caused by regulated industry such as the Environmental Protection Agency’s new protections against lead in drinking water, the Consumer Product Safety Commission’s new safety standards for baby products, anti-smoking measures from the Department of Health and Human Services, and consumer protections from the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau.
This list was generated through a search of the Unified Agenda of Regulatory and Deregulatory Actions and the Federal Register, and will be updated periodically as rules are finalized.
To flag new developments that should be reflected in this tracker, please contact Elizabeth Skerry at eskerry@citizen.org.