Why you shouldn’t criticize Trump for his regulations order

President Trump’s decision to cut back on needless or counterproductive government regulations has triggered sharp criticism — and a lawsuit — from groups whose websites have become assaults against the president. On this, they should hold fire.

Many regulations from decades ago were adopted in response to issues that no longer exist or matter. Some are designed to favor one group over another. And in certain industries — starting with health care and financial services — rules have been adopted without enough attention being paid to how much they cost businesses and consumers.

Support for regulatory relief used to be bipartisan. Perhaps President Jimmy Carter’s greatest accomplishment was his successful deregulation of airlines, trucking, railroads, oil and beer, bringing down the costs of travel and triggering the craft-brewing revolution. President Bill Clinton launched a “reinventing government” initiative soon after taking office that endorsed “streamlining procedures and reducing paperwork.” Carter had far more success than Clinton, but it’s striking that two of the last three Democratic presidents saw overregulation as a major problem.

Trump’s regulatory relief plan hasn’t been precipitous and his embrace of a British policy under which two rules must be abolished for every new rule isn’t as dangerous as some interest groups would have you believe. Says who? Says the man who was President Obama’s choice to be administrator of the White House Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs, Harvard law professor Cass R. Sunstein. In a Feb. 8 column for Bloomberg View, Sunstein noted that Trump’s Jan. 30 executive order endorsing the “one in, two out” approach didn’t apply to independent regulatory agencies, such as the Securities & Exchange Commission, or to routine regulatory actions, or to rules that respond to emergencies, or to rules specifically established in laws enacted by Congress and the president.

“The ‘one in, two out’ policy could be an effective way ... to press agencies to remove regulations that are taking an excessive toll on the economy, on small businesses and on individuals,” Sunstein wrote.

“The broader point,” he added, “is that the policy could be carried out in a way that would remove essential safeguards, create chaos in government and violate the law — or instead in a way that is sober, knowledgeable and professional.” With an interim guidance document clarifying the Jan. 30 executive order, “the Trump administration took a welcome, and quite major, step in the latter direction.”

Especially in a state where excessive building regulations have led to a housing crisis and contributed to the nation’s highest poverty rate, the case for regulatory relief is obvious. Trump’s presidency has outraged and unnerved many Americans. But on this issue, so far, so good.

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