Document Type

Book Chapter

Publication Date

6-2025

Abstract

In the United States, the public has long benefited from the role played by administrative agencies with a degree of autonomy from the White House, each agency with distinct duties and authorities to implement the law as set out by Congress.

In its first hundred days, the second Trump administration has moved rapidly to centralise control over all administrative agencies, including so-called independent agencies, which have long operated at a greater remove from the White House than ‘executive’ agencies like the Department of State and the Department of Commerce. The administration is asserting an interpretation of the Constitution known as ‘unitary executive theory’ which, in its pure form, holds that the President has the inherent power to fully control all federal agencies, regardless of statutory design. Such presidential supremacy, in a break with history, converts ‘independent’ agencies into ‘executive’ agencies, significantly increasing the role of White House staff in their operations. It also changes how all departments and agencies operate, with less insulation for their adjudicatory proceedings and less protection for civil servants.

In this chapter, we examine what these changes may mean for the economy. We build on the broad economic research consensus on the value of agency autonomy in central banking (a consensus that is generally shared by political observers and policymakers in both parties). While that research focuses on monetary policy, we think it also bears on how increased presidential control may affect other economic agencies and, in turn, the economy.

Disciplines

Administrative Law | Law | President/Executive Department

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