Small Business Regulatory Reduction Act of 2025

Floor Speech

Mr. Speaker, I rise in opposition to H.R. 2965, the Small Business Regulatory Reduction Act.

Let me begin by stating that I wish we were here to talk about bills to help small businesses grow or policies that address challenges they are facing today, like tariffs and the cost of groceries and healthcare. Instead, we are talking about an unworkable regulatory budget.

To be clear, small businesses are not talking about regulations. It ranks near the bottom of their list. Inflation, tariffs, and finding good employees are some of the top challenges facing small businesses.

Take a walk down a Main Street, Mr. Speaker, and you will hear the same concern from small business owners up and down the block: The uncertainty and rising costs tied to the President Trump tariffs are crushing their small businesses, plain and simple.

We should be working together on issues that matter: lowering costs for small businesses. Instead, we are considering two regulatory bills that will not help them one iota, while real problems go unaddressed.

H.R. 2965 may sound good on the surface, but it will have the practical effect of limiting the SBA from issuing any rules, even if the benefits outweigh the costs.

The SBA needs to issue regulations to update programs, issue disaster regulations, and even reduce recordkeeping requirements. That is good government practice.

The majority fails to realize that agencies may be able to estimate the cost of a regulation, but they do not have the hard data on the costs that are imposed.

This bill will require the SBA to make assumptions that could turn out to be incorrect. There is nothing in the bill that clarifies how the agency is to implement a regulatory budget, and it is therefore impractical.

Finally, the bill does not include an exception for national emergencies, meaning that if this bill had been enacted before the pandemic, small businesses across the country might not have received PPP assistance in a timely manner, if they received it at all.

For these reasons, I oppose the Small Business Regulatory Reduction Act, and I urge my colleagues to oppose it.

Mr. Speaker, I will close with this: Trump's tariffs, not regulations, are crushing small businesses. I know that it is painful for the other side of the aisle to discuss or even debate the issue of tariffs and how it is negatively impacting small businesses. The President of the United States said that on day one he will lower the costs. Yet, here we are.

Witnesses have testified before our committee that the costs of tariffs are harming their small businesses. The uncertainty resulting from the on-again, off-again pronouncements by Trump has halted investment and expansion of small businesses, and it has hindered basic business decisions, like when to put in an order or how to plan for the holiday season.

I know they don't want to talk about tariffs and, instead, we are debating these two bills.

The American Action Forum estimates that Trump's tariffs are costing small businesses $85 billion a year, and that is not including the cost of navigating the uncertain environment or complying with the tariffs themselves.

The tariffs disproportionately harm small firms, which operate on thinner margins and have virtually no buying power. Yet, we are focused today on a regulatory budget that is unworkable.

The bill has no exceptions for national emergencies. Let's look back to 2020. SBA issued scores of rules to provide relief to help small businesses during the pandemic, so the author of the bill is incorrect when she claimed that SBA didn't issue regulations to make sure that people accessing the money from PPP will not commit crime, abuse, or fraud.

The Paycheck Protection Program imposed significant compliance burdens on small businesses, but I believe we can all attest to the fact that the PPP helped millions of small businesses stay afloat that otherwise would have gone out of business. Clearly, the benefits of those regulations at the time outweighed the costs.

Had a regulatory budget been in place in 2020, it would have been extremely challenging for SBA to cut existing regulatory programs to offset the cost of the Paycheck Protection Program. Moreover, many of the lending rules ensure accountability and fair access. Cutting them to free up funds for PPP would have compromised the integrity of the program.

Moreover, these funds needed to be disbursed quickly. Imposing a no- new-spending-without-cuts approach would have delayed or reduced aid to small businesses.

The bottom line is that this bill is slogan over substance and would harm small businesses rather than help them, particularly in a crisis.

Mr. Speaker, I urge my colleagues to oppose this bill, and I yield back the balance of my time.

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Ms. VELAZQUEZ. Mr. Speaker, on that I demand the yeas and nays.

The yeas and nays were ordered.

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