Browse regulations

The CyberCorps SFS program provides scholarships to cybersecurity students at participating institutions, requiring post-graduation service in federal, state, local, tribal, or qualifying nonprofit cybersecurity roles for a period equal to scholarship duration. Recipients must begin service within 18 months and complete it within 5 years, with repayment or loan conversion for non-compliance. Deferrals and discharges are available for hardship, disability, or exceptional circumstances. The program aims to bolster the public sector cybersecurity workforce.

Federal intervention distorts labor markets, crowds out private scholarships, and misallocates educational resources. Administrative costs and compliance burdens impose hidden taxes, while the repayment mechanism creates moral hazard. Market forces alone would better balance cybersecurity workforce needs without bureaucratic central planning.

This regulation establishes the administrative process for the Hermit's Peak/Calf Canyon Fire Claims Office, created by Congress to compensate individuals and entities for injuries caused by the U.S. Forest Service's prescribed burn that became a catastrophic wildfire. It defines claim filing requirements (Notice of Loss by Nov 14, 2024), allowable damages (property loss, business loss, financial loss, subsistence resources), coordination with other benefits, burden of proof standards, and appeal procedures. The process includes provisions for partial payments, documentation reimbursement, and requires claimants to waive alternative remedies (FTCA/civil actions) in exchange for expedited compensation.

This is not a regulation imposing ongoing compliance costs on the public, but rather a narrow, time-bound administrative remedy for victims of specific government negligence. The costs are direct compensation payments from the federal government to injured parties, not hidden taxes or burdens on third parties. The alternative—litigation under the Federal Tort Claims Act—would impose far greater transaction costs, delays, and uncertainty on victims seeking redress. The streamlined process with clear rules and administrative appeal rights minimizes overhead while providing a legitimate channel for tort-like compensation. This mechanism serves the rule of law by acknowledging government responsibility and providing a defined path to restitution, rather than leaving victims to navigate the complex, costly ordinary litigation system against the sovereign.

The regulation implements NAGPRA, requiring museums, federal agencies, and certain state entities that receive federal funds to return Native American human remains and cultural items to lineal descendants, tribes, and Native Hawaiian organizations. It establishes processes for determining cultural affiliation, mandates consultation and deference to traditional knowledge, requires consent for research/exhibition, and sets procedures for claims and repatriation.

Deletion would permit continued possession of Native American remains and cultural items without consent, violating property rights and perpetuating historical theft. The regulation creates a clear, enforceable process for repatriation that would not arise voluntarily, as institutions have strong incentives to retain these items.

This regulation establishes federal quality measurement requirements for state Medicaid and CHIP programs through standardized 'Core Sets' of healthcare quality measures. It mandates annual reporting by states, requires stratification of data by demographic factors, and imposes compliance timelines and procedures for exemptions.

The regulation imposes substantial compliance costs on states—costs ultimately borne by taxpayers—without clear evidence of commensurate benefits. It distorts incentives toward meeting metrics rather than improving care, creates perverse gaming opportunities (Goodhart's Law), and federalizes what should be state-level decisions about healthcare quality measurement. The stratification requirements and annual reporting mandate significant administrative burden that diverts resources from actual patient care, while the standardized approach reduces state flexibility to innovate or tailor measures to local needs. The unseen costs include opportunity costs of state staff time, IT system upgrades, and the bureaucratic complexity that inevitably follows centralized measurement mandates.

Definitions and acronyms section establishing legal terminology for Medicare and Medicaid regulations, covering program structure, provider types, payment mechanisms, and eligibility categories within the federal healthcare entitlement system.

This regulatory framework underpins unconstitutional federal overreach into healthcare, violating Tenth Amendment principles. Medicare and Medicaid have created massive market distortions, price inflation, and dependency while crowding out voluntary, private solutions. The entire $1+ trillion program structure represents an unsustainable transfer that violates liberty and federalism—healthcare must return to free markets and state/private provision.

Temporary DEA regulation authorizing telemedicine prescribing of Schedule II-V controlled substances without in-person evaluation, with conditions including PDMP review, six-month limit, pharmacy ID verification, and for OUD treatment only (for certain schedules). Separate rules for VA practitioners with similar safeguards.

Deleting would eliminate vital access to medically necessary controlled substances, especially for opioid use disorder treatment, forcing patients to obtain in-person evaluations that are often infeasible due to geography, mobility, or time constraints. The regulation achieves expanded access through targeted safeguards (PDMP checks, time limits, identification verification) that effectively balance safety and convenience—a coordination that individual states could not provide given federal preemption under the Controlled Substances Act.

Comprehensive EPA regulation setting emission standards for heavy-duty engines (trucks, buses) covering criteria pollutants (NOx, HC, PM, CO) and greenhouse gases (CO2, CH4, N2O). Includes certification, testing, onboard diagnostics, SCR inducement systems, and compliance mechanisms across model years 2013-2027+. Forces manufacturers to meet federally mandated limits or obtain credits.

This $2+ trillion regulatory regime imposes crushing compliance costs on manufacturers, with small firms bearing 30% higher per-employee costs, creating barriers to entry and protecting incumbent monopolies. The one-size-fits-all standards ignore regional differences and diverse operational needs, violating the knowledge principle. Federalizes local air quality issues reserved to states under the 10th Amendment, while the hidden tax on households exceeds $14,000 annually. Alternatives like tort liability, property rights enforcement, or state-level standards would address pollution without the bureaucracy, captured rules, and unseen economic destruction.

EPA regulation requiring PFAS manufacturers and importers to submit extensive annual reports containing detailed company information, chemical identities, use categories, production volumes, byproduct data, health/environmental effects studies, and worker exposure data through electronic systems, with criminal penalties for non-compliance.

This reporting mandate imposes massive compliance costs—particularly crushing for small businesses—while delivering uncertain benefits. It centralizes decision-making through data collection, creating barriers to entry that protect incumbent corporations. The unseen costs include diverted resources from innovation, higher consumer prices, and expanded federal power over chemical innovation that should be determined by markets or states. Information gathering without clear limits leads inevitably to overregulation, not better outcomes.

Establishes detailed procedures for EPA review of confidential business information (CBI) claims under TSCA, including submission requirements, substantiation, public copies, generic names for chemicals, electronic reporting through CDX/CISS, and criteria for deficient claims.

Imposes substantial compliance burden through mandatory certifications, detailed substantiation, redaction requirements, and electronic submission systems—costs that fall disproportionately on small businesses and create barriers to market entry. The procedural complexity serves primarily to expand bureaucratic overhead rather than protect legitimate trade secrets, which could be safeguarded through simpler assertion mechanisms and existing legal frameworks, representing a hidden tax that stifles innovation and competition in the chemical industry.

Regulation implements Clean Water Act Section 401 water quality certification process requiring federal permit applicants to obtain state/tribal certification that discharges will comply with water quality requirements, establishing procedures for applications, timeframes, decisions, neighboring jurisdiction involvement, and Tribal program administration.

Imposes substantial compliance costs and delays on businesses, especially small firms, through a complex federal bureaucracy that exceeds constitutional limits and distorts economic incentives. The unseen costs include reduced investment, stunted development, and federal invasion of state sovereignty over water resources—harms that outweigh any marginal water quality benefits that could be better achieved through state regulation and property rights protection.

This regulation establishes mandatory procedures the USPS must follow when considering closing or consolidating USPS-operated retail facilities (post offices, stations, branches). It requires 60-day public notice, written proposals analyzing community impact, employee effects, economic savings, and other factors. It provides for 30-day appeals to the Postal Regulatory Commission and includes rules about preserving community ZIP codes and addresses. The regulation applies to discontinuance actions initiated on or after July 14, 2011.

The regulation imposes unnecessary procedural burdens on postal operations, delaying rational economic decisions about facility closures. It protects unviable post offices from market discipline through bureaucratic hurdles, increasing USPS deficits and costs to taxpayers. The federal government should not be in the postal business at all; this regulation perpetuates a constitutional violation of federalism by federalizing local postal services that belong to states and private enterprise under the Tenth Amendment.

These are federal accessibility guidelines for pedestrian facilities in public rights-of-way, implementing requirements under the ADA, Rehabilitation Act, and Architectural Barriers Act. They mandate specific accessibility standards for newly constructed or altered sidewalks, crosswalks, curb ramps, pedestrian signals, transit stops, street furniture, and related infrastructure, including detectable warnings, accessible routes, and technical specifications.

This regulation imposes massive unfunded mandates on local governments, inflating infrastructure costs and diverting resources from other essential services. The technical specifications represent federal overreach into traditionally local land-use and transportation decisions, violating principles of federalism. Compliance costs per employee for small municipalities are crushing, and the one-size-fits-all approach removes local flexibility to balance accessibility with unique constraints and budgets, exemplifying regulatory mission creep that burdens taxpayers without demonstrable proportional benefit.

WIFIA is a federal loan and loan guarantee program administered by the Army Corps of Engineers for water infrastructure projects (primarily dam safety/maintenance). It provides subsidized credit covering up to 49-80% of project costs, subject to federal conditions including Buy American requirements, Davis-Bacon prevailing wages, NEPA compliance, and selection criteria favoring projects with national/regional significance, innovation, or benefits to disadvantaged communities.

This program violates constitutional federalism by federalizing local water infrastructure decisions that belong to states and municipalities under the Tenth Amendment. The subsidized credit distorts market price signals, encouraging malinvestment in projects that wouldn't survive private capital markets. Hidden costs include: (1) taxpayer-backed credit risk and subsidies; (2) complex application favoring sophisticated entities over small communities; (3) protectionist Buy American and Davis-Bacon rules artificially inflating costs; (4) federal bureaucracy imposing one-size-fits-all requirements over local priorities; and (5) regulatory capture whereby well-connected projects secure subsidies at the expense of unsubsidized competitors. Infrastructure should be financed through private markets or local governments accountable to affected communities, not through Washington's redistributive lending programs.

This part establishes the Central Intelligence Agency's procedures for processing Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) requests, including fee structures, request requirements, processing timelines, and protections for confidential business information and national security secrets.

This regulation implements a transparency law that promotes government accountability without imposing costs on the public or businesses. It provides citizens a mechanism to access records while appropriately protecting national security and confidential commercial information. The fee structure is cost-recovery based and includes waivers for public interest requests. Deleting this would reduce transparency without eliminating any meaningful compliance burden.

This regulation prescribes procedures for the Office of the Director of National Intelligence (ODNI) to implement the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA). It covers request submission, processing timelines, fee structures by requester category (commercial, educational, scientific, news media), appeals process, handling of classified information and interagency consultations, confidential commercial information protections, and expedited processing criteria.

These procedural rules implement FOIA for the intelligence community, balancing transparency with legitimate national security and confidentiality concerns. Deleting them would eliminate the structured framework that allows citizens to access unclassified ODNI records while protecting classified information, trade secrets, and personal privacy—undermining accountability without which intelligence activities would lack public oversight. The rules prevent arbitrary treatment of requesters and provide appeal mechanisms, essential for rule of law in classified domains.