DOGE Track

Regulatory Rollback

DOGE has also been supporting the general Project 2025/conservative project of regulatory rollback. On Feb 19th, Trump signed an executive order Ensuring Lawful Governance and Implementing the President’s “Department of Government Efficiency” Deregulatory Initiative (yes, they all have titles like this) which declared that DOGE and the OMB should be involved in reviewing every agency’s regulations to revoke any that it deems unnecessary for the agency’s statutory duties. It also set the unrealistic standard that 10 regulations must be revoked at agencies before they can add a new one.

DOGE’s work here has involved the following threads:

  • Reviewing Regulations As mentioned before, DOGE staff have sometimes been heavily involved in scrutinizing regulations, specifically ones that are seen to be violating the administration’s rules against DEI or acknowledging the impact of climate change. The actual process of revoking regulations is not something that DOGE can just do quickly and unilaterally; it requires following the Administrative Procedure Act, so DOGE’s contribution there has been to suggest regulations to remove, often identified by an AI process.
  • Firing Regulators in some cases, DOGE has been involved in eliminating positions or offices that are in charge of enforcing regulations. DOGE has also terminated contracts or grants that are used to support regulatory processes.
  • Stop-Work and Snitch Lines If you can’t remove a regulation, you can always suspend enforcement. Early on, DOGE set the template for this tactic at the CFPB, with agency leadership setting up a special “snitch line” email address for the public to report if agency staff were still working.
  • Elimination DOGE has frequently claimed that it’s allowed to eliminate agencies for not being statutorily compliant, and many regulations are derived from statute. That said, DOGE still tried to eliminate the CFPB, mainly because Russell Vought harbored an intense dislike for it, and I would expect one goal of deregulation is to also eliminate more personnel and departments.

System Access

Name Description
HUD
A database to measure the financial condition of public housing agencies and assess their ability to provide safe and decent housing.
HUD
A custom tool developed by college student Christopher Sweet that uses AI models to analyze regulations at HUD to determine which can be eliminated or reframed. DOGE is planning to use this tool at other agencies as part of a drive to eliminate 50% of all regulations across the federal government.
Christopher Sweet (4/XX, admin access)
Date Event
February 2025
2/01/25
Source
Trump fires Rohit Chopra, the independent director of the CFPB. The deputy director of the CFPB, Zixta Martinez, assumes the role of acting director.
2/07/25
Source
Elon Musk posts a tweet “CFPB RIP” with a tombstone emoji
2/10/25
Source
In an email sent to all staff, Russell Vought orders the CFPB’s headquarters to be indefinitely closed. He also orders: “Please do not perform any work tasks. If there are any urgent matters, please alert me through Mark Paoletta, Chief Legal Officer, to get approval in writing before performing any work task. Otherwise, employees should stand down from performing any work task.”
2/13/25
Source
The CFPB RIF team, including Adam Martinez meets with Jordan Wick, Jeremy Lewin, and OPM officials on a video call. Jeremy Lewin and Jordan Wick talk off screen with Acting Director Russell Vought, and Wick tells the group that they want formal RIF notices to go out no later than February 14. The team receives a template from OPM for firing 1200 employees “at night on the 13th.”
2/14/25
Source
The judge, Amy Berman-Jackson grants a temporary restraining order against CFPB leadership until a hearing for a preliminary injunction to prevent them from shuttering the agency by eliminating staff and canceling all contracts. DOGE and CFPB leadership had been racing to eliminate 1175 positions before the restraining order was announced.
2/19/25
Source
Trump issues an executive order EO 14219 “Ensuring Lawful Governance and Implementing the President’s Department of Government Efficiency Deregulatory Initiative” which requires agency heads to consult with DOGE teams on deregulatory efforts.
2/19/25
Source
A staffer at the EOP emails DOGE staff to take part in a webinar about the National Environmental Policy Act.
 Daniel Abrahamson, Tyler Hassen, Katrine Trampe
2/20/25
Source
At an internal planning meeting for the temporarily paused Reduction In Force, CFPB COO Adam Martinez confirms the White House plan was to completely end the CFPB within 30 days. The plan was to reduce the CFPB to “five guys and a phone,” ie to the minimum number of positions that were mandated by the text of Dodd-Frank (the bill that created the CFPB). Staff were informed there was no need to abide by federal data retention regulations because there would be nothing left of the agency to maintain.
March 2025
3/03/25
Source
In a hearing for a preliminary injunction, Judge Amy Berman Jackson expresses fears that CFPB will be “choked out of its very existence” while the litigation progresses. Concerned with misleading answers from the admininistration’s lawyers, she orders a evidentiary hearing in a week and continues the restraining order against layoffs.
April 2025
4/08/25
Source
Jacob Altik and Ashley Boizelle meet in the FCC headquarters with the Chief of Staff Greg Watson to discuss the FCC’s progress on removing regulations.
 Jacob Altik, Ashley Boizelle, Tarak Makecha, Jordan Wick
4/12/25
Source
CFPB leadership under Russell Vought uses the opening granted by the appeals court to attempt another massive RIF. Emailing from his USAID email account, Jeremy Lewin kicks off the process by providing Gavin Kliger and Adam Martinez with a letter to use for RIFs at the CFPB.
 Gavin Kliger, Jeremy Lewin
c.4/15/25
Source
Christopher Sweet is reported to be using an AI model to analyze HUD regulations and suggest revisions. These are presented to HUD staff for review in a large spreadsheet. It is not clear how the AI system is making these determinations. (fuzz: Date is unspecified, just sometime earlier in April)
c.4/20/25
Source
In a meeting between HUD and DOGE, Jacob Altik says they are planning to use Christopher Sweet’s AI model analyzing regulations at HUD to review the entire Code of Federal regulations for regulations to review. (fuzz: Date is unspecified, just sometime earlier in April)
 Jacob Altik, Christopher Sweet
4/28/25
Source
Jordan Wick sends an email to the FCC General Counsel asking for data on National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) reviews for cell phone tower installations. He then asks to meet with a technical contributor about the feasibility of adding a new feature to their review tracking software. Narrowing environmental review is a Trump administration priority.
May 2025
5/05/25
Source
DOI extends its freeze on issuing any new regulations out to June 4th.
5/05/25
Source
Ashley Boizelle mails the Chief of Staff (and head of the DOGE team) at FCC to ask how the agency handles outside comments on high-profile rulemakings and if they contract with an outside service.
 Ashley Boizelle
5/13/25
Source
The CFPB, still under the acting leadership of Russell Vought, withdraws a rule proposed in December that would limit the ability of data brokers to sell sensitive information by placing them under the oversight of the Fair Credit Reporting Act (FCRA).
June 2025
6/27/25
Source
DOGE staff are reportedly detailed to work with the ATF General Counsel on revising or eliminating over 50 regulations by July 4th. This would likely make it easier to purchase firearms. They miss this deadline.
6/30/25
Source
Ashley Boizelle mails the Chief of Staff (and head of the DOGE team) at FCC for information about their deregulation work at the agency.
 Ashley Boizelle
July 2025
c.7/01/25
Source
Christopher Sweet participates in a meeting at HUD to discuss more permanent hosting options for the AI deregulation tool which had been running internally. This could be the precursor to providing it as a service to other agencies. (fuzz: Meeting reported as in week of 2025-06-30)
7/01/25
Source
DOGE staff at the SEC reportedly have been holding meetings in recent weeks pressuring SEC staff to eliminate regulations around blank-check companies and confidential reporting by private investment funds that were finalized in the Biden administration.
7/01/25
Source
DOGE gives a presentation of a “DOGE AI Deregulation Decision Tool” that will use AI to target roughly 50% of federal regulations for elimination, on the argument that they aren’t meeting statutory requirements. The goal is to slash these regulations by January 20, 2026. In their presentation, DOGE claims the tool has already made determinations on 1083 decisions at HUD (using Christopher Sweet’s work) and has also been used for 100% of deregulatory actions at the CFPB. It also states that DOGE lawyers James Burnham, Austin Raynor, Jacob Altik and Ashley Boizelle have vetted and endorsed the tool.
August 2025
c.8/03/25
Source
SEC leadership meets with DOGE representatives Jonathan Mendelson and Christopher Sweet to discuss using Sweet’s AI tool to identify regulations to cut or modify at the agency. It’s unclear if Sweet is detailed to the agency or just demonstrating the tool to SEC staff. Reportedly, agency staff then used the tool to identify thousands of regulations to cut. The list will then be reviewed by agency leadership and lawyers. (fuzz: Date given is “a short time after” the AI task force is created)
 Jonathan Mendelson, Christopher Sweet
8/13/25
Source
In a call hosted by the US CIO, DOGE team lead Scott Langmack shares info on an AI tool named SweetREX Deregulation AI Plan Builder developed by Christoper Sweet to review agency regulations for elimination. This is the same tool highlighted by DOGE in a presentation to the White House earlier in the month. Agency representatives from the Environmental Protection Agency, the Department of State, and the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation are on the call. Steve Davis also was on the call despite having left DOGE and asked if the tool could be open-sourced.
 Steve Davis, Scott Langmack, Christopher Sweet
Anti-Personnel
Impunity