13. Environmental Protection Agency · Notable
End EPA activities lacking clear congressional authorization
Printed page 422 13. Environmental Protection Agency
“EPA should not conduct any ongoing or planned activity for which there is not clear and current congressional authorization, and it should communicate this shift in the President’s first budget request.”
What has happened
- Partially done
EPA put the argument in its budget request and acted on part of it. The FY2026 congressional justification addendum says the reorganizations will "return the EPA's focus to what Congress has directed the agency to accomplish" and "better align core statutory requirements with its organizational structure", and the second phase of the reorganization was announced under the banner of better fulfilling statutory obligations. Offices EPA judged non-statutory were eliminated and their statutory staff reassigned. No list of activities lacking authorization has been published, and no statement says the review is complete.
Research log
What was searched, and what didn’t count as evidence
Research notes
- The Quote has two halves: stop conducting unauthorized activity, and say so in the first budget request. The second was done — the FY2026 justification and its reorganization addendum both frame the restructuring as a return to what Congress directed. The first is open-ended and cannot be shown complete.
- Partial, on the reading for open-ended “all X” asks: a directive plus documented implementing actions (OEJECR eliminated, ORD dissolved into program offices, grants canceled), with no statement that the sweep is finished.
- The budget request itself is #1058; the offices eliminated are #1043 and #1047.
- Action
- eliminate
- Object
- EPA activities lacking congressional authorization
- ID
- 1059