Chairman, Committee, Pass Four Bipartisan Regulatory Reform Bills

Press Release

Chairman Ron Johnson (R-Wis.) and the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee voted on a bipartisan basis Wednesday to approve four bills that reform the regulatory process.

These bills are the first step toward increasing accountability and improving the quality of the regulatory process. Taken together, these bills address gaps among agencies in the requirement to do cost-benefit and other analyses and to build automatic lookback procedures so that regulations are reviewed after several years. Further, the reforms address deficiencies in the rulemaking process aimed at improving the quality of regulatory analysis, making more uniform these analysis requirements across all agencies, and codifying smart regulation principles that have been supported by Democratic and Republican administrations for over two decades.

"This legislation was the result of hard work by the members of the committee to find areas of agreement and show a willingness to compromise," Johnson said of the reforms.

The committee also approved seven other bills unanimously, including the Fair Chance Act, legislation that would give an opportunity to formerly incarcerated individuals to have a fair chance at employment. Also approved was legislation to reduce government waste, increase accountability and help protect the nation's borders.

"The committee's work today exemplifies the type of incremental, continuous improvement approach that the committee has emphasized this congress," Johnson said. He thanked Ranking Member Tom Carper (D-Del.) for contributing to such an approach.

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