When Congress Disapproves

As we usher in a new presidential administration, the flurry of executive orders has been overwhelming.

On his first day back in office, President Donald Trump issued 26, and by Feb. 5 that number expanded to 54. To provide perspective, according to the Federal Register, President Franklin Delano Roosevelt holds the record with 93 in his first 100 days in office and Trump issued 33 during the first 100 days of his first term. The 100th day of Trump’s second term is April 30, 2025, so he has time to surpass FDR’s record, and there’s nothing this president likes more than winning.

Executive orders are presidents’ best-known tool for furthering their agenda or ending disliked policies from their predecessors without buy-in from Congress. In fact, one of Trump’s first executive orders on Jan. 20 revoked a long list of orders from President Joe Biden. But the legislative branch has its own tool for similar purposes.

Congress can use the Congressional Review Act (CRA) to overturn federal agency actions. It can be used anytime, but is usually applied at the beginning of a new executive administration. The CRA was enacted as part of the Small Business Regulatory Enforcement Fairness Act of 1996 to provide Congress more oversight of the executive branch. Essentially, the CRA requires federal agencies to report issuing final or interim final rules (how an agency interprets certain laws) to Congress before they go into effect and gives both chambers authority to use special procedures to consider legislation to overturn rules. If a CRA joint resolution of disapproval is approved by both houses of Congress and signed by the president, or if Congress successfully overrides a presidential veto, the rule at issue cannot go into effect or continue in effect.

There is a time limit with this procedure. A joint resolution must be introduced within 60 days of continuous session beginning on the date the rule is published in the Federal Register and received by Congress. Every calendar day is counted in a days of continuous session period, including weekends and holidays, and the only days excluded are those during which either chamber (or Congress as a whole) is gone for more than three days pursuant to an adjournment resolution.

The CRA also provides a “look back period,” which gives Congress 60 working days before the end of a session through the 15th working day of the next legislative session to address a regulation. This period ensures that all rules get the full 60 working days of consideration and in recent years has been when most CRA activity occurs. Rules issued during this time face a greater risk of being overturned when there is both a new president and a new session of Congress. There can be political pressure to undo the rules the previous administration put in place right before the election.

Members of Congress have introduced 461 resolutions of disapproval since 1996, but only 20 have made it into law, according to the George Washington University Regulatory Studies Center.

The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and the Department of Health and Human Services have been the most frequent targets, with 74 and 50 introduced resolutions, respectively. Of the 20 that have been passed, nearly all have occurred in recent history. During the first Trump administration, the 115th Congress overturned 16 rules issued at the end of the Obama administration. In the 117th Congress during the Biden administration, lawmakers overturned three rules issued toward the end of the Trump administration. Of those 19 dismissed rules, 10 were promulgated by the Department of the Interior and the Department of Labor—including the Stream Protection Rule from the EPA regarding waterways and coal mining waste and the Department of Labor’s rule on defined criteria for classifying workers as independent contractors.

As of Feb. 6, the current Congress had issued 29 joint resolutions of disapproval, mostly regarding final rules issued by the EPA. Many more resolutions are expected in the next few months.