Press Releases

U.S. Congressman Garret Graves (South Louisiana) introduced bipartisan legislation this week to bring transparency and efficiency to the federal regulatory state – the PROVE IT Act. Regulations cost our families and businesses nearly $2 trillion annually, according to a 2020 analysis by the Competitive Enterprise Institute. These federal rules are an invisible tax – more expensive than corporate and personal income taxes combined – that hurt America's economic competitiveness.

"Unelected bureaucrats sitting in their ivory cubicles writing hundreds-paged rules on topics they know little about make it harder to run a business – plain and simple. The combined impact of regulation on top of regulation is devastating. The only jobs bad regulations create are in the federal government and in other countries," Graves said.

Federal agencies can be prone to underestimate real-world compliance costs. The Graves bill establishes provisions to make regulators "prove it":

• Requires agencies to perform regular lookbacks at 5-year intervals for all major rulemakings
• Requires a report to Congress on whether the rule is still meeting its regulatory objective and whether modifications to the rule could achieve better results while imposing a smaller burden/lower cost
• Reopens public dockets for stakeholder feedback
• Requires Agency to consider feedback
• Encourages a culture within agencies where costs are not taken for granted and benefits are more carefully considered
• Encourages agencies to better incorporate comments from stakeholders during the rulemaking process
• Increases transparency
• Facilitates stakeholder dialogue throughout life of rule

"Our bill is about bringing fairness and transparency to the federal regulatory system," Graves added. "When an agency tells the American people how much a regulation will cost, they will be held accountable to that."

More Background:

H.R. 1920 - The Providing Retrospective Observations Validating the Economics and Increasing Transparency (PROVE IT) Act would promote transparency in executive rulemaking, requiring the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) to report to Congress on a cost-benefit analysis of any major rulemaking that is expected to have an annual effect on the economy of $100 million or more; result in a major increase in the cost of prices for consumers, industries, or agencies; or an adverse effect on economic indicators like employment.

The PROVE IT Act gives Congress the authority to require agencies to conduct regular lookbacks and report to Congress when actual cost and benefits vary from agency predictions. It also requires agencies to produce reviews to determine whether a rule is meeting its regulatory objectives and to re-engage with local employers to identify ways to accomplish the objective at a lower cost to regulated entities.

Congressman Henry Cuellar (D-TX) joined Rep. Graves as an original cosponsor of the PROVE IT Act.