Political Quotes

“Mr. Speaker, I urge my colleagues to support H.R. 890, the Guidance Out Of Darkness Act, or the GOOD Act. Regulatory guidance includes agency statements that, while not intended to have the force and effect of law, establish agency policies on statutory, regulatory, or technical issues. Since such guidance communicates how an agency will administer a law and its programs, it has a significant effect on regulated entities. Regulated entities and the public should know what agency guidance says about the laws and programs that affect them. However, guidance documents are not easy to find. They are not consistently posted on agency websites. This inconsistency burdens regulated entities. It especially burdens small businesses that often lack the resources to hire compliance experts. The problem is so bad that agency guidance documents are known as ``regulatory dark matter.'' For a brief time, the prior administration brought needed sunshine to this situation. Following the GOOD Act's passage by the House during the 115th Congress, the prior administration voluntarily adopted the bill's reforms through an October 2019 executive order after the Senate failed to act. Under the executive order, guidance was required to become fully transparent online. Across the government, each agency was directed to make available on its website a single searchable, indexed database with links to all guidance documents in effect.…”