Implementing Executive Order, FTC Calls on Public and Regulated Community to Identify Anticompetitive Regulations for Potential Repeal

The second Trump administration has issued a slew of deregulatory measures aimed at turbocharging the reduction of regulatory bloat (EO 14192, requiring the repeal of 10 regulations for every new one issued), ensuring regulations conform with (in its view) the Constitution, federal law, and Supreme Court jurisprudence (EO 14219), and that all federal regulators — employed at heretofore “independent” agencies or not — are responsive to the president’s deregulatory philosophy (EO 14215, requiring presidential approval for all rulemaking initiatives). A major new initiative focuses on the impact of federal regulation on competition, placing the nation’s top antitrust enforcers at the center of a governmentwide project to identify for repeal “regulations that reduce competition, entrepreneurship, and innovation.”

Executive order 14267, titled “Reducing Anti-Competitive Regulatory Barriers,” spells out a four-part process for identifying and repealing (or amending) regulations that fit this bill. First, the heads of all federal agencies, working together with the chair of the Federal Trade Commission (Andrew Ferguson) and the attorney general (Pam Bondi), are directed by mid-June 2025 to “complete a review of all regulations subject to their rulemaking authority and identify those that” create or preserve barriers to competition, forestall market entry, or otherwise reduce competition or innovation.

Next, agency heads must submit lists identifying anticompetitive regulations to the FTC chair and attorney general, recommending whether “each of the listed regulations warrants rescission or modification in light of its anti-competitive effects,” and specifying proposed amendments where appropriate. Agencies must also justify in writing the non-inclusion of anticompetitive regulations, when not selected for amendment or recission.

The FTC chair and attorney general then have 90 days (through mid-September 2025) to provide a “consolidated list of regulations that warrant rescission or modification … along with recommended modifications” to the Office of Management and Budget. Finally, the OMB determines whether to include the recommendations in the Unified Regulatory Agenda developed pursuant to executive order 14219, which would kick off the formal process for amendment or repeal.  

The executive order requests the public’s assistance in finding regulatory candidates suitable for the administration’s chopping block. Toward that end, the FTC has issued a request for information. The public has until May 27, 2025, to submit comments identifying regulations that “exclude new market entrants, protect dominant incumbents, and predetermine economic winners and losers” and the basis for their listing.

Carlton Fields is at the leading edge of helping companies navigate the ongoing changes to the administrative state imposed by the new administration. If there are industry regulations calling out for repeal, contact the author of this article or your usual firm contact, as, at least in modern times, the environment for deregulation has never been more hospitable.