Explaining the Brookings Regulatory Tracker

The Brookings Center on Regulations and Markets Regulatory Tracker (“Reg Tracker”) is a tool that tracks and provides insights into important regulatory actions by the federal government. Originally launched in October 2017, the Reg Tracker monitors a curated selection of executive agency rules, guidance, and policy introductions or revocations, as well as executive actions like executive orders. The rules span a wide range of policy areas, including but not limited to education, labor, environment, and transportation.

This post provides context surrounding the regulatory process, details on what actions the Reg Tracker encompasses, and guidance on how to use its interactive features.

Background on the Reg Tracker

The Reg Tracker was initially launched under the name “Tracking deregulation in the Trump era” in October 2017 to monitor key regulatory changes during the first Trump administration. In particular, early in his first term, President Trump signed Executive Order 13771, the “two-for-one” deregulation order that required agencies to offset the cost of any new regulation by repealing and eliminating the costs associated with at least two existing regulations. Our tracker sought to monitor the impact of this executive order, as well as to highlight other key policy changes enacted by the executive branch. For more information about the methodology for the Reg Tracker during Trump’s first administration, check out this blog post.

At the beginning of the Biden administration, the tracker was relaunched to track President Biden’s major regulatory and executive actions. With President Trump now back in the White House for a second term, we are relaunching the tracker to track major regulatory and executive actions taken by the Trump administration, with particular focus on deregulation, a recurring theme in Trump’s policy approach. In the next section, we will help you understand and navigate the updated tracker.

What is included in the Reg Tracker?

Most entries in the Reg Tracker are regulations that are enacted through the rulemaking process of federal agencies. The Reg Tracker also includes policies enacted through other means, such as executive orders, memos, and guidance documents.

It is important to note that the Reg Tracker is not comprehensive. Instead, the tracker encompasses a curated set of rules that the Center on Regulation and Markets (CRM) staff deems to be particularly important. We use four key characteristics to determine if a rule should be included in the tracker:

1. Media attention. If staff finds a rule receives coverage from a major news outlet, then we will consider including it in the tracker.
2. Litigation. Rules that are the subject of any new or ongoing litigation may be included in the tracker after a more detailed review of the litigation action.
3. Rollback of Biden rule. At the start of Trump’s second term, we expect that many rules will be explicitly aimed at repealing or revising regulations that had been passed during the Biden administration. We aim to include many of these rules in the tracker.
4. General impact. If a rule does not meet any of the above qualifications but seems as though it will have a particularly strong impact based on staff judgement, then it may be included.

Using these criteria, the Reg Tracker is intended to provide a curated list of economically or politically significant, controversial, or otherwise newsworthy regulatory events. We exclude rules that are arcane, routine, or otherwise uncontroversial.

Understanding the Federal rulemaking process

The rulemaking process is largely governed by the Administrative Procedure Act (APA). The APA outlines multiple methods for rulemaking. Rules are typically issued through informal rulemaking. This process involves a public notice-and-comment period, where federal agencies must provide a public “notice of proposed rulemaking,” which explains the agency’s proposed rulemaking, and allows interested parties to comment on the rule accordingly. All proposed rules are published in the Federal Register to notify the public and provide them with the opportunity to submit comments. These proposed rules typically have commentary periods (the amount of time that interested parties can submit comments) of around 30 to 60 days, with some exceptions for more complex rules or if it is justified by the agency.

Before a rule is proposed, an agency may take some preliminary steps to involve the public in the rulemaking process before issuing a proposed rule. Agencies gather information through unstructured processes from interested parties and can receive a “Petition for Rulemaking” from a member of the public before issuing a proposed rule. In addition, an agency in the pre-rule stages may issue an “Advanced Notice of Proposed Rulemaking” to receive comments from the public.

Once the commentary period is over, agencies then consider the submitted comments and work to finalize the rule. Agencies must base their reasoning and conclusions behind the final rulemaking on comments, scientific data, expert opinions, and facts accumulated during the pre-rule and proposed rule stages.

When a rule is finalized and published in the Federal Register, the APA requires that the rule goes into effect at least 30 days after the date of publication unless an agency justifies an immediate effective date by arguing there is “good cause” that an immediate effective date is in the public interest.  

Once a rule has been finalized and published in the Federal Register, individuals and organizations may file a lawsuit that claims that they have been or will be adversely affected by a rule. Courts may evaluate whether a rule is unconstitutional; exceeds the agency’s authority; was issued without adhering to the notice-and-comment procedures mandated by the APA or other applicable laws; or is arbitrary, capricious, or represents an abuse of discretion. If a court rules against the agency and vacates all or part of a rule, it typically sends the rule back to the agency to correct the deficiencies. The agency may be required to reopen the commentary period or to restart the rulemaking process.

Navigating the Reg Tracker

The search bar

The search bar at the top of the tracker allows you to filter rules by the nature of action, policy area (category), and current status. We have also included checkboxes where you can choose whether to include rules from the first Trump administration (rules that have not been updated since January 19, 2021) or from the Biden administration (rules that were updated between January 20, 2021 and January 19, 2025). Finally, at the far right, there is a search function, which combs through both the headers and detail text of rules for a key word or phrase of your choosing.

The rule header

For each rule, you will see the same header (an example of which is shown above). On the far left is a nickname for each rule or set of rules. You can then find information on the nature by which the rule was enacted (whether through agency rulemaking or some other process), relevant policy categories, the agency or agencies sponsoring the rule, and the current status of the rule. Lastly, the far-right column indicates the date that the entry was last updated by CRM staff.

Rule details

Once you click on a rule, the entry will expand to give a more detailed summary. There will be a brief summary of the rule and then a more detailed overview. The overview is divided into two-to-four parts, based on the particular rule: background (which provides information on the current state of the policy the rule is changing), impact (which describes how the rule would change the policy along with the significance of this change), litigation (which details if any litigation on the rule is pending or resolved), and notes (where any other relevant information is listed). For regulations enacted through agency rulemaking, you will also see a timeline for each action under the rule heading that shows the dates that the rule was proposed, finalized, and effective (with links to relevant pages in the Federal Register). The color of the timeline indicates the party of the administration involved at that part of the process, while the “arrow” or “X” indicates if the rule successfully progressed or was blocked. For executive orders, guidance documents, or other policies not passed through agency rulemaking, in place of the timeline will be a block of text indicating the type of regulatory action.

Related rules

After clicking on the rule to view the more detailed summary, there may be additional rule headings and rule details which automatically display below the rule heading clicked on. These additional rules are related to the top rule in a chronological manner, with older rules listed first. Typically, a rule is modified or superseded by the rule below it, often issued by a subsequent administration, though a single administration may also revise its own previous rules.