ARTICLE · 29 NOVEMBER 2019

Implementing Executive Orders On Agency Guidance: What Businesses Should Know

Lewis Brisbois Bisgaard & Smith LLP

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On October 31, 2019, the Office of Management and Budget, Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs (OIRA), published a memorandum (the OIRA memo).

United StatesGovernment, Public Sector

Karen C. Bennett

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Washington, D.C. (November 26, 2019) - On October 31, 2019, the Office of Management and Budget, Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs (OIRA), published a memorandum (the OIRA memo) instructing the regulatory agencies on how to implement an October 9, 2019 Executive Order, EO 13891, "Promoting the Rule of Law Through Improved Agency Guidance Documents." (See our October 17 legal alert covering this EO and EO 13892, which both set forth strict requirements for how agencies use informal or draft policy documents and require transparent, public processes for the issuance of guidance, as well as its use in civil enforcement actions).

EO 13891 requires agencies to ensure that any effort to impose legally binding requirements on regulated entities must proceed through the rulemaking process. It also establishes a single, searchable website of all guidance documents and makes clear those documents lack the force of law, and further rescinds all guidance documents

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