Zero-Based Regulatory Budgeting To Unleash American Energy

Enumerated powers · passes

This is executive supervision of executive agencies under Article II, Section 1 and the duty to take care that laws be executed under Article II, Section 3. The order does not create new statutory authority and repeatedly limits action to the extent permitted by law and consistent with law, leaving Congress statutes in Article I, Section 8, Clause 3 and Clause 18 and property authority in Article IV, Section 3, Clause 2 intact. Directing review, comment, and sunset rulemaking through the Administrative Procedure Act is a lawful exercise of presidential direction, not legislation.

Bill of Rights · passes

The order restricts no speech, religion, press, assembly, arms, privacy, trial, jury, or punishment right. It does not search, seize, compel testimony, quarter troops, or impose excessive punishment. No provision under Amendments 1 through 8 is implicated. Under the Ninth Amendment and Tenth Amendment, reducing lingering regulatory burdens protects retained rights and reserved powers rather than infringing them.

Individual liberty · passes

The order lessens restraint on the person, property, labor, and enterprise by requiring agencies to reexamine energy regulations and let unjustified rules lapse. The burden is placed on the government to justify continuation after public review, consistent with due process liberty under the Fifth Amendment and retained rights under the Ninth Amendment. No belief, speech, movement, or lawful use of property is newly restricted.

Decentralization · passes

Energy, nuclear safety, navigable waters, outer continental shelf, and migratory species work crosses state lines and involves federal property and statutes, so individuals and counties alone cannot handle it, while states could handle much onshore production. The order does not consolidate upward; it pushes review downward by forcing federal regulators to rejustify rules, take public comment, and remove unjustified rules to the extent permitted by law. Because it reduces rather than expands higher-level control, it satisfies the Tenth Amendment direction.

Due process and takings · passes

The order creates no fine, seizure, taking, or criminal presumption. It expressly requires action only to the extent consistent with law, requires a sunset rule, requires public opportunity to comment on costs and benefits, and preserves extensions under section 4(d). Procedural due process under the Fifth Amendment and Fourteenth Amendment is therefore honored through notice and comment, substantive action is non-arbitrary periodic review, and no property is taken without just compensation under the Fifth Amendment Takings Clause.