Accountability Comes to the Independent Agencies
President Donald Trump took a significant step forward in consolidating his administration’s control over executive-branch policy by issuing a Feb. 18 executive order titled “Ensuring Accountability for All Agencies.”
The accountability order extends direct presidential oversight beyond the “core” executive-branch departments to federal “independent agencies,” including multi-member commissions, such as the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), the Federal Trade Commission (FTC), and the Federal Communications Commission (FCC). In tandem with a Jan. 31 Trump executive order on deregulation, the accountability order could significantly advance economically beneficial regulatory reform and promote much-needed consistency and coherence in executive-branch policymaking.