This past week of rulemaking followed an emerging trend from its immediate predecessor: a steady stream of overall cost savings but also some sizable paperwork burden increases. All told, the week had a dozen rulemakings that contained some kind of measurable economic impact. The main deregulatory items of the week came from the Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) and Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB), respectively. The largest portion of new paperwork, however, came from a Department of Education (ED) rule on student lending that the agency nevertheless claims to be deregulatory. Overall, federal agencies published roughly $4.6 billion in total cost savings but added 2.6 million paperwork burden hours.

REGULATORY TOPLINES

• Proposed Rules This Week: 33
• Final Rules This Week: 62
• 2026 Total Pages: 23,855
• 2026 Final Rule Costs: -$1.1 trillion
• 2026 Proposed Rule Costs: $122.7 billion

NOTABLE REGULATORY ACTIONS

The most consequential rulemaking of the week was the proposed rule from NRC regarding “Licensing Requirements for Microreactors and Other Reactors [W]ith Comparable Risk Profiles.” The proposal seeks “to establish a risk-informed and performance-based regulatory framework for rapid licensing of new microreactors and other reactors with comparable risk profiles and for high-volume deployment of these reactors.” While the commission expects the new compliance requirements for these “first-of-a-kind microreactors” to result in roughly one million hours of additional paperwork each year, the overall cost savings to affected entities far outweighs that burden. Per the associated Regulatory Analysis, NRC estimates that this new framework will result “in net averted costs” (as compared to the current regulatory code) to industry of $3.5 billion over a 40-year time horizon. The proposal comes on the heels of some other significant changes to nuclear power licensing requirements.

The other sizable deregulatory action of the week was the final rule from CFPB on “Small Business Lending Under the Equal Credit Opportunity Act (Regulation B).” The rule is the latest volley in a long line of rulemakings regarding provisions from the Dodd-Frank Act “governing the collection and reporting of small business lending data.” This iteration significantly pares back various reporting requirements that were implemented by a Biden-era rulemaking on the matter. CFPB estimates that narrowing the scope of this data collection will result in roughly 4.9 million fewer hours of paperwork each year, yielding $186 million in annualized savings.

The last substantial rulemaking of the week was the final rule from ED titled “Reimagining and Improving Student Education-Federal Student Loan Program Final Regulations.” The rule implements a series of provisions from the legislation commonly known as the “One Big Beautiful Bill Act” (now referenced as the “Working Families Tax Cuts Act”) making various changes to the federal student loan program. Much of the rule’s economic impact is due to its implications for lending volume – an aspect that is a matter of shifting transfer payments – but there will also be consequences for the administrative burdens involved.

The agency estimates that, under this new student lending framework, there will be a net increase of nearly 6.5 million hours of paperwork. Per the rule’s accounting statement, this represents $37.2 million in additional annualized costs. Curiously, in the section on its regulatory budget implications, ED claims that the rule is in fact “deregulatory” in nature and will yield $11.1 million in net cost savings annually. Nothing in the rulemaking document’s cost-benefit calculations, however, provides further context of how the agency arrived at such a figure. There is also (at least at this time) no accompanying document in the regulatory docket to support this conclusion either.

TRACKING TRUMP 2.0

In assessing 2026 rulemakings that include an Executive Order (EO) 14192 determination, there have been 29 “deregulatory” rules with combined total savings of $1.1 trillion against four “regulatory” rules that involve roughly $41.6 billion in costs. Adding that to the total agencies produced during 2025 (at least from rules that had a clear “regulatory” or “deregulatory” designation), the Trump Administration has enacted $1.2 trillion in total cost reductions thus far under EO 14192. Rules for which agencies have claimed one of the EO’s explicit exemptions have accounted for an additional $508 million in costs so far in 2026.

CONGRESSIONAL REVIEW ACT (CRA)

As noted last week, it was only a matter of time before President Trump signed H.J. Res 140. The president did so last Monday, bringing the total number of CRA resolutions enacted into law this term to 23. On the other end of Pennsylvania Avenue – and other side of the aisle – Democratic lawmakers introduced another set of resolutions seeking to rescind Trump Administration rules. Senator Tim Kaine (D-VA) introduced one against a Department of Justice immigration rule, while Senator Sheldon Whitehouse (D-RI) had a couple focused on Environmental Protection Agency rules. These resolutions remain mere exercises in political messaging, however, with no realistic chance of moving legislatively.

The AAF CRA tracker provides a full survey of activity under the law thus far into this term. As of today, members of the 119th Congress have introduced CRA resolutions of disapproval addressing 134 “rules” across the Biden and Trump Administrations that collectively involve $173.3 billion in estimated compliance costs. Of these, 23 have been passed into law, repealing a series of Biden Administration rules that had a combined $3 billion in associated compliance costs. The Trump Administration estimates that the repeal of this rule yields an additional $936 million in savings. While the main window of CRA action has largely passed, there are still outstanding resolutions that could move legislatively. AAF will continue to monitor and update such developments as appropriate.

TOTAL BURDENS

Since the start of 2026, the federal government has published $940.6 billion in total regulatory net cost savings (with $1.1 trillion in reductions from finalized rules) and 42.1 million hours of net annual paperwork increases (with 10.2 million hours coming from final rules).