Congress Still Threatening Safeguards with CRA Resolutions

For Immediate Release: May 28, 2024
Contact: David Rosen, drosen@citizen.org

WASHINGTON, D.C. – Members of Congress continue to introduce new Congressional Review Act (CRA) resolutions of disapproval that threaten important health, safety, consumer, workplace, and environmental protections, according to the Coalition for Sensible Safeguards, which is tracking them. 

According to the coalition’s tracker, 80 rules have been targeted for repeal – 21 of which have faced votes on the House or Senate floor. The targeted rules protect small businesses, workers, consumers, students, veterans, investors, people of color, clean air, clean water, renewable energy, wildlife, gun safety, and more.

To date, 13 resolutions have passed in the House, and 16 have passed in the Senate. President Biden has vetoed all 10 resolutions that passed in both chambers. Congress has attempted and failed to override each of those 10, preventing any of the rules targeted so far from being repealed.

“Congress has voted on at least one CRA resolution every month since February 2023, except during the August 2023 recess, illustrating the persistence of the threat to the public’s health, safety, and wellbeing,” said Rachel Weintraub, executive director of the Coalition for Sensible Safeguards. “Fortunately President Biden has defended regulatory safeguards against these baseless and often politically motivated attacks.”

The CRA allows Congress, by a simple majority vote in both chambers – with limited debate and no possibility of a filibuster, to overturn recently issued rules. The president can veto the resolution of disapproval, and Congress can seek to override that veto. If a CRA resolution of disapproval becomes law, the targeted rule is void and can have no effect.

The underlying law also contains a lookback provision that allows a new Congress to use the CRA’s expedited process to strike down rules passed in the final months of the previous presidential term. However, the exact date when the lookback period begins is unknowable until the current Congress ends. Typically it falls in May or June. Rules finalized after that date can be targeted for repeal not only in the current Congress but also in the opening months of the next one.