Regulations From the Executive in Need of Scrutiny Act of 2023

Floor Speech

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Mr. McCLINTOCK. Mr. Chairman, this bill presents a question that is fundamental to the central architecture of our Republic: Who is to make law?

This has been pointed out, and the Constitution is very clear on this: ``All legislative powers herein granted shall be vested in a Congress of the United States.''

What about that passage do my friends on the other side of the aisle not understand?

The Founders wanted it to be hard to make laws so that society isn't smothered by them. They wanted every voice in the land to be heard through their elected representatives and be accountable and answerable to the people.

The modern regulatory state takes these powers from the people and gives them to unelected bureaucrats. An unelected agency writes the law, and then it enforces the law that it has written. If it accuses you of violating its law, you have to answer to the agency in a court run by that agency without a jury, and the agency keeps the fines that it assesses on you. Is there any more profound threat to a democracy than that?

Ten times more laws are written by the regulatory agencies today than by the people's representatives. Americans now have 10 times the chance of being hauled into an administrative law court for breaking an agency regulation than they have of being charged with a statutory crime where they have the full protection of the Bill of Rights.

The REINS Act starts to put this genie back in the bottle by requiring that regulatory acts that impose more than $100 million of costs to the American public must be enacted by the elected Congress. That means if you don't like that law, you can hold your elected representative directly accountable. That is what a democracy is, a government that answers to the people.

Opponents of this bill tell us that we must defer to the experts. That is not a democracy. That is an oligarchy. We have just endured the folly of experts--lockdowns and mandates the experts told us would slow the spread of COVID. We now have study after study documenting that their measures not only failed to protect us but did incalculable damage to the economy and to the education of our children, and needlessly cost lives through delayed health screenings and treatments, drug and alcohol-related deaths, and increased suicide rates. No representative voted for these measures. The regulatory state simply imposed them.

Experts are there to advise us from every perspective. It is then the responsibility of elected representatives on behalf of the people to sort through their perspectives and advise and chart a course that takes into account all the issues at hand and be accountable and answerable to the people for those decisions.

Mr. Chair, this bill starts us back toward that democracy.

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