membership for the palestinian people is through direct negotiations between israel and the palestinian authority with the support of the united states >> tonig, bert f. kennedy and all the campaign rally in austin, tas watch live at 8:30 p.m. eastern on c-span, c-span now our free mobile video app or online at c-span.org. >> congress returns tuesday for legislative business and votes. the house is back at noon eastern. later inheeek, lawmakers will vote on legislation to auorize f.a.a. programs for five years. currenrams are set to expire friday at midnight. membs ll also consider bills quing event ticket sellers to disclose a total ticket pres including fees and several measures in supportf law enforcement during national

poce w the senate is back at 3:00 p.m. eastern. senators wil vote on executive d dicial nominations for u.s. district and circuit court. tclive coverage of the house on c-span and the senate on c-span 2. you can watch with our video ap c-span now or online at c-span.org. >> a conversation now on regulatory policy across presidential administrations. our guest is sarah hay as george washington university. trump proved. his agenda. trump used 1996 law to overturn obama era regulation. erring to there is the congressional review act. what is it? why do we have it? guest: so the congressional review act was enacted in 1996

as a way for congress to retain oversight of federal regulation and so it's kind of an ex pabssive -- expansive law. it can cover any regulation, the broadest definition of regulation that we have, under the administrative procedure act. and so when regulations are disapproved using the c.r.a., agencies are barred from reissuing them in a substantially similar format and the regulation is taken off the books immediately. host: maybe we should start with what are regulations? guest: absolutely. host: and who promulgates regulations and what is that process? guest: so regulations effect your everyday life. it's making sure the bacon you have for breakfast this morning is safe. it's making sure your dish washers are energy efficient. regulations are issued by federal agencies to implement the laws that congress passes. host: why was it felt in 1996 that a congressional review act

was -- why do we need to renew these regulations if it goes through a big review process and a public comment process, when these regulations are being promulgateed? guest: that's a great question. this came following a supreme court case in the 1990's that eliminated the legislative veto and basically said that congress needs to pass laws to change agency actions and so the congress has the congressional re-- passed the congressional review act to give them a fast-track procedure for reviewing agency regulations. host: but it's a procedure that hasn't been used very often since 1996. but was used a decent amount right after donald trump comes into office. guest: exactly. host: explain why and how it's been used. guest: as you mentioned, it really was not used that frequently until 2017. we only saw one rule overturned in 2021. but then -- 2021 -- 2001. but then when trump came into power, congress saw this tool and took advantage of it to overturn 15 regulations from the very end of the obama

administration. host: what did they target? what regulations did they want to overturn? guest: they targeted regulations that really run the gamut of policy areas generally from labor and employment to finance regulations, to the environment, to education. and so they targeted regulations in those spaces. host: a congressional review act overturning of a rule seems to be most useful for when an administration comes in of a different party and has a congress who can actually use this legislative power that's also of that same party of the presidency. guest: right. host: so compare when else this has been used then. how many other times since 1996 have we seen this been put in place. guest: as i briefly mentioned, we saw this used once at the beginning of the bush administration in 2001, overturning a clinton era ergonomics rule from osha and then the biden administration in

congress in 2021 also used this to overturn three trump regulations. those were -- one was environment, one was equal employment, those kinds of things. and so these administrations will use them to advance their regulatory priorities in that way and i'll speak a little bit about why we didn't see anything at the beginning of the obama administration. it's because the c.r.a. has been traditionally thought of as a deregulatory tool and we think that the obama administration was a little bit shy about using this deregulatory tool and preventing agencies from taking substantially similar actions in the future. host: i know it's a small sample size, of how many rules have been overturned, but is it mostly environmental rules that get targeted? workplace safety rules? what is usually the low hanging fruit for a c.r.a. overturning of a law? or rule, i should say. guest: that's a really good question. as we mentioned, the trump administration issued the most

-- or congress under the trump administration passed the most of these c.r.a. resolutions and those were targeting the labor space. but as i alluded to, they target really any policy area. but i think something that's interesting to note is that a lot of these rules are not major rules so a major rule is something that has an annual effect on the economy of $100 million or more every year. only a handful of the rules that have actually been overturned by the c.r.a. were major rules which is a little bit counterintuitive. you would think they would use such an easy tool to get a quick policy win on a big topic. but it's really been more of these smaller rules that we've seen. host: what's an kpwafrpl of a major rule -- an example of a major rule? guest: let's think about something that just came out this past week. i think the federal trade commission's noncompete clause rule is likely a major rule, if i remember correctly. because those are rules that have a large impact on the environment. or on the economy.

host: when we're judging major, not major rules, it's monetary impact and is it cost is usually what they're going for or is it benefit as well? guest: that's a really good question. i don't remember off the top of my head, but i think it is just annual economic impact, whether that is costs or benefits. host: major rules and minor rules, what's -- the congressional review sabgt and how it's been used, that's our topic until the end of our program this morning, sarah hay is our guest from george washington university. it's the regulatory studies center there. taking your phone calls. as usual, phone lines split by political party, (202) 748-8000 for democrats to call in. republicans, (202) 748-8001. and independents, (202) 748-8002. she's one of the authors of a report on how the c.r.a. has been used across administrations.

what do you focus on at the regulatory senter? guest: we're a nonpartisan academic center at george washington university. we do that through studying regulation like these conversations we're having here today. host: what is the best way to improve regulatory policy in your mind right now? if you were the regulatory czar of the biden administration? guest: that's a great question. i'll think about that and get back to it later. host: (202) 748-8000 for democrats, republicans, (202) 748-8001. and independents, (202) 748-8002. was there a specific incident that jump-started the event law that became the congressional review act in 1996? what was happening at the time? guest: that's a good question. i mean, the politics at the time were the clinton administration was in power and there were republicans coming into congress but, yeah, i'm not 100% sure

about that background there. what i can tell is you that the c.r.a. has been really used effectively since then and something interesting to note as well is that, beyond being used to overturn regulations like this, members of congress use it as a political messaging tool to some extent where they'll introduce a resolution targeting an administration action, even though it might not pass congress or it might not be signed into law. we've seen congress this session introducing a lot of these actions, targeting biden administration regulations and all of the ones that have passed have been vetoed by the president because presumably he doesn't want to overturn regulations issued by his own administration. so it's another interesting facet of this tool. host: is there a statute of limitations on how long a regulation can be on the books before it's safe from a congressional review act review? guest: yes. there's a couple components of your question here. tpa*eufrt first of all, -- first of all, the c.r.a. has a 60-day

action window. once an agency issues a regulation and it's reported to congress, then congress has about 60 days to take action, give or take recess days. but then there's also the lookback period which is the end of a session of congress, the last 60 working days of the session, whether that's legislative days in the house or session days in the senate, congress can review those rules that are issued during that period in the subsequent session of congress. so those kind of have a grace period to give congress its full 60 days of review. so that's why the c.r.a. is particularly potent during these political transitions that we've been talking about. host: for that time frame for how long you can do this, take us to what generally happens at the end of an administration or the final year of a potential administration that may not be re-elected in the beginning of an administration. specifically, coming back to that "wall street journal" headline, biden is racing to

trump-proof his agenda. what is he trying to do here? guest: so as i just talked about, the lookback period. that period, those regulations are vulnerable in the next congress if there is a political transition. and so what we've seen the biden administration do this year, that's really unique, is they issued 34 economically significant rules in april, which is the most in our history of data tracking at the regulatory studies center. and so you can kind of use that as a political signal for the biden administration that they're trying to solidify their top regulatory priorities before the earliest estimates of that lookback window. the earliest estimate of the lookback window is late may this year. and so any regulations that are finalized before then are almost certainly safe from the c.r.a. host: questions coming in from social media. m in pennsylvania saying, i do hope your segmentplay many times, every time som says --

host: in terms of how much the public pays attention to regulations versus how much congress and staff is paying attention to regulations, what do you generally see here? is this a hot topic? guest: it's definitely a to the topic in the regulatory space -- a hot topic in the regulatory space right now but regulations aren't what we learn about in our government classes in high school. so i think it's a great thing that these conversations are being picked up by your show, by "wall street journal" right now and really engaging the public in this law that used to be considered really obscure.

host: linda in sanford, north carolina. independent. linda, you're on with sarah hay. caller: yes, thank you for taking my call. and for the most part i don't agree with anything on c-span but for the most part, you know, i rate it about a 75. host: on agreement or disagreement? caller: about 75 -- y'all are a little too liberal for me. i will be very honest. because i am a 73-year-old american. my family members and my husband's family members have fought and died and give their life for this country. and i agree with the topic today. i'm going to stay on topic. biden regulations and potential rollbacks under trump. biden ain't my president. and biden -- everything biden does, when trump gets back in there, he's going to roll it back. and those people are a bunch of

thugs and all that, i'm going to get off the subject a little bit here, but all this protest stuff, october 7 and january 6, the same people. host: linda, i want to keep it to regulations. because we have sarah hay here to talk about regulatory policy. how much, if this story is talking about what the biden administration ising trying -- is trying to do ahead of a potential trump administration, how much have candidate donald trump's staff talked about targeting specific regulations? how much are members of congress looking to target specific regulations? guest: which ones is the hard question because we don't know what is going to fall into the lookback period because we don't know when it's going to be but what i can say is that i've heard from colleagues at the government accountability office that they are getting a lot more requests from members about

whether certain things count as rules and could be subject to the c.r.a. host: this is dan in palm bay, florida. republican. dan, we're talking regulations with sarah hay. caller: hi, yeah i wondering, i was wondering what regular laces -- regulations, what biden regulations are they planning on handcuffing donald trump with? i mean, don't they realize that donald trump's economy was way better than joe biden's? everyone sees that. i mean, there's no denying that. unless people were just tkhraourbal like your guest appears to be or she's -- host: dan, i think our guest knows quite a bit about regulations. handcuffing the next administration with regulatory policy, can an outgoing administration do that? guest: not really. so there are a couple different ways to overturn regulations, even beyond the c.r.a.

and so those actually exist in all three branches of government. so agencies could start another notice in comment rulemaking process in which they, again, draft another regulation, receive more comments on it and issue another regulation that contradicts the old one and takes its place. there's litigation is an option and then congress can pass legislation to say agencies can or cannot do these things, as well as using appropriations to say, that's a nice rule you got there, but you can't use any of your funding to implement it. so there are ways to overturn regulations. the reason we're talking about the c.r.a. right now is because of the approaching lookback window and how this is a much faster process than any of those that i laid out to overturn regulations. host: when you promulgate a regulation, you mentioned the comment period. who generally comments on regular stphraeugs is it just industries that are impacted? are there certain people that you keep finding pop up in the comments section, can any

americans comment on any proposed regulation? guest: any americans can and should comment on proposed regulations. that's a really great way to get involved in the government. and we see comments come from a range of actors, definitely industry groups, as well as nonprofits, a lot of them will organize what we call mass comment campaigns where -- it used to be called postcard campaigns where you'd send in a postcard to the agency but now it's a form letter you type in online at regulations.gov and everyday americans, academics like us comment on regulations. and everyone can and should. i really believe that's a good way to get involved in the regulatory process. i can also mention that the biden administration has been taking steps to increase public engagement in the regulatory process through making opportunities for public engagement known through tools like the unified agenda and just being more cognizant of getting new stakeholders involved in the process. host: academics cots