Progressive policymakers are curiously allergic to admitting that some government programs should be shut down. This fetish for bureaucracy is often excused by the realities of governing: It is sometimes difficult to reorient systems built up over decades toward achieving progressive outcomes. But it is important not to confuse good programs run badly with programs designed to subvert progressive goals. The Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs, or OIRA, falls into the latter camp. The next president has the authority to effectively eliminate OIRA. He should exercise that authority on the first day of his presidency.

OIRA is the most powerful agency most Americans have never heard of. It was created in the Carter administration as part of a wave of deregulation, with the goal of imposing a level of centralized control over the rulemaking process. In the 40 years since, under every subsequent president, the agency has only gotten stronger. Now, OIRA is a procedural gauntlet wielded by presidents and narrow-minded economists to limit agencies’ ability to exercise the authority delegated to them by Congress.

OIRA works by forcing agency rules through an opaque and pedantic White House review process—both before agencies propose rules for public comment, and again before they promulgate final rules. This process acts to slow down rules or halt them altogether. It also allows industry to play a special and secretive role in the rulemaking process, outside of the existing public-comment process otherwise required by law.