Washington’s bureaucracy, expanded and emboldened by the Biden-Harris administration, feels so secure that most managers would impose new regulations even if voters “overwhelmingly” rejected their plans.
In the latest sign of the disconnect between Washington’s “swamp” and the rest of the country, 54% of federal government managers would defy voters to do what they want, according to a new Napolitan Institute survey conducted by Scott Rasmussen and shared with Secrets.
In a survey of 500 federal managers, Rasmussen asked: “Imagine that you work for a government agency and have the ability to draft new regulations. After carefully researching an important issue, you determine that a new regulation is needed. If voters overwhelmingly oppose that regulation, what should you do?”
Just 35% would follow the wishes of voters and trash their regulation while 54% would “follow your research and issue the regulation.” The rest were unsure.
Napolitan, which has been surveying “elites” and federal managers, said that the survey was reinforced by other recent polls revealing the arrogance of the swamp. In another, for example, 51% of federal managers believe that people have “too much individual freedom.” Just 31% said they have “too little.”
The findings underscore efforts by former President Donald Trump and conservative groups to “drain the swamp” and put civilian managers in charge.
Biden and Harris have rejected that effort, and both have pushed for more and more executive orders to avoid Congress and voters to impose their agenda. Only changing which party controls the White House can stop that trend.
Trump has promised to cut red tape and trim the federal workforce. In his first administration, he initially went on a binge of cutting regulations.
Critics of agencies making laws and regulations instead of Congress condemned the poll results.
Clyde Wayne Crews, the regulation expert at the Competitive Enterprise Institute, told Secrets, “The idea that bureaucrats could be so audacious as to be predisposed to impose regulations despite public opposition is not surprising. Such attitudes and actions fully align with the most fundamental tenets of the administrative state, which has, since its inception, prioritized the rule of experts.”
Since Biden entered the White House, Crews has documented the growth of regulations pouring out of agencies. He reported that the administration has tried to hide its actions by raising the price of regulations that have to be revealed.
Crews also said that Biden has moved to push new regulations on several areas of American life because he does not control Congress.
“It’s challenging to identify any aspect of life that the government regards off-limits with respect to its banging around: not health care, schooling, retirement, finances, housing, energy, work life, wages, infrastructure, R&D, nor even consumer products like gas cans, e-cigarette and vaping paraphernalia, and residential dishwashers,” said Crews, the Fred L. Smith fellow in regulatory studies at CEI.
“Granted, access to essential functions such as infrastructure, a safe food supply, credit, air traffic control, and airplane security are vital. But the very government stewards in charge often impede their progress. So anger rather than surprise is the appropriate takeaway from the survey,” Crews added.
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Crews has been advocating for regulation reform and demanding that Congress play its required role of reviewing new rules from agencies. But, he said, little is unlikely to change if the current administration continues under a President Kamala Harris.
The bottom line, he told Secrets: “To what extent is it incoherent and tone-deaf to talk about administrative state reform when a socialist is president of the United States? The attitude of bureaucrats is a given when that is our deeper predicament.”