Project 2025 Tracker / What’s done, what’s next

14. Department of Health and Human Services · Minor

Invoke the Defense Production Act only in the gravest circumstances

Not started

492 14. Department of Health and Human Services

“The President should invoke the Defense Production Act, which is a form of temporary takeover of private enterprises, only in the gravest circumstances.”

What has happened

  1. Not started

    A sixth contrary instrument, and a widening rather than a new invocation. Executive Order 14427 of 2026-09-08 amends Executive Order 13603 again — six months after Executive Order 14391 did — to put the Secretary of the Interior beside the Secretary of Energy for the Act's priorities-and-allocations authority over energy (sections 201(a)(2) and 202(b) of EO 13603), and to delegate the section 101(c) authority to the Secretaries of the Interior, Commerce and Energy, "each of whom may exercise such delegated authority independently of the other". Energy disputes between the two Secretaries go first to the National Energy Dominance Council. More officials may now wield the Act, each acting alone — the opposite of reserving it for the gravest circumstances. The Status stays not-started under playbook 3b, with the contrary action as dated Evidence.

  2. Not started

    The record moves the other way. The President has invoked the Defense Production Act repeatedly and for ordinary industrial policy rather than in the gravest circumstances: a section 303 waiver for munitions and minerals (signed 2025-05-23), five section 303 determinations on the same day for coal, energy infrastructure, grid capacity, petroleum and natural gas (2026-04-20), a section 708 determination and delegation (2026-06-11), a section 101 determination on critical minerals (2026-07-30), and Executive Order 14391 adjusting DPA delegations (2026-03-13). The most recent invocation is recorded here; playbook 3b keeps the Status at not-started with the contrary action as dated Evidence. **A fifth contrary instrument, found under read-queue ticket 04 and read on 2026-09-03:** the Office of Legal Counsel's opinion *Preemptive Effect of Defense Production Act Order on State Law*, March 3, 2026, holds that presidential orders under congressionally delegated authority "have the force of federal law under the Supremacy Clause and may preempt state law", that "an order issued pursuant to the Defense Production Act may preempt state laws expressly or by conflict", and that such an order "may displace sanctions for non-compliance with a contrary consent decree, even if that consent decree rests on federal-law claims." That is the Executive's own lawyers broadening what a DPA order can do, which is the opposite of the restraint this Quote asks for.

Research log

What was searched, and what didn’t count as evidence

Research notes

  • A search of the presidential documents in the Federal Register that we keep and search, for “Defense Production Act”: eight in-window presidential documents, all invocations or delegations, none a restraint.
  • Nothing in the window narrows the circumstances in which the Act may be used. The opinion index OLC itself maintains was searched on 2026-09-03 and the only in-window DPA opinion is the March 2026 preemption opinion cited above; it broadens rather than narrows.
  • This item is on p. 492, whose other asks #1378, #1380 and #1382 were flagged for a closer read. It moved nowhere, but it gained its fifth contrary instrument because the page’s other asks were checked against the same read.
  • The sixth, read 2026-09-10: a second “Adjusting Certain Delegations Under the Defense Production Act”, signed 2026-09-08 — https://www.whitehouse.gov/presidential-actions/2026/09/adjusting-certain-delegations-under-the-defense-production-act-e2de/ It amends EO 13603 “as amended by Executive Order 14391”, so it builds on the March order rather than repeating it. March added the Secretary of Energy to the section 203 delegation and told agency heads holding a delegation that they need not route recommendations through the President under EO 14156. September adds the Secretary of the Interior to three delegations — EO 13603 sections 201(a)(2), 202(b) and 203 — each Secretary able to act “independently of the other”, and sends energy disputes between them to the National Energy Dominance Council, or to it and the National Security Council where defense infrastructure is involved. Recorded as the 2026-09-08 event. It was suggested that the 2026-07-30 event be re-dated to it instead; a dated event is not rewritten in this record, so the order has an event of its own.
  • Also read and set aside: H.R. 10316 (2026-09-08), To require the President to declare a national housing emergency and invoke the Defense Production Act to incentivize residential housing production — a bill pressing for a broader invocation than the Quote wants, referred to committee the day it was introduced. A bill that has only been introduced does not count as progress, and a bill that has moved nowhere is not the administration doing anything.
  • 2026-09-11: published as Executive Order 14427, 91 FR 58007 (FR 2026-18739), and added to the 2026-09-08 event as its Federal Register citation. Like EO 14426, it reached our records late, as a backfill: signed on the date our previous check ended and published three days later. Our stored record’s title, EO number, signing date and citation match the whitehouse.gov text read on 2026-09-10. We read the Federal Register text at govinfo on 2026-09-11. Section 2 amends EO 13603 sections 201(a)(2), 202(b) and 203 (the section 101(c) delegation) as the event note says, and adds a dispute-referral clause to 201(d) that sends energy disputes to the National Energy Dominance Council.
Action
restrict
Object
Defense Production Act
ID
1376