Rand Paul: Abolish Seven Federal Regulatory Agencies

Abolish Consumer Product Safety Commission; Consumer Reports magazine can do the job.


Paul plans to introduce an amendment on Thursday calling for the repeal of seven independent agencies, ranging from the Affordable Housing Program and the State Justice Institute to the Corporation for Public Broadcasting and the Consumer Product Safety Commission.

The CPSC, an independent agency created in 1972 to protect "against unreasonable risks of injuries associated with consumer products," has the authority to regulate the sale and manufacture of more than 15,000 different products, including children's toys, swimming pools and all-terrain vehicles. Among the dozens of potentially dangerous products recalled by the agency so far this month are wooden playpens (for choking and laceration hazards), wall-mounted fireplaces (fire and fall hazards), and ATVs (fire hazards).

Paul's staff says that public-interest outlets such as Consumer Reports are fully capable of protecting the public from dangerous products.


Asked to explain the senator's rationale, Paul spokeswoman Moira Bagley wrote in an email to The Huffington Post:

Regarding your Qs about the CPSC, we do plan on eliminating the Consumer Product Safety Commission. Plenty of independent and efficient consumer groups exist across the U.S.; Consumer Reports, for example. It's time that the federal government retreats from such services, as its presence in this arena is unnecessary and was never intended in the first place.

Though that sentiment is certainly flattering to the venerable magazine's staff, Jim Guest, the president and CEO of Consumers Union, the nonprofit group that publishes Consumer Reports, strongly disagrees with the idea of eliminating the CSPC.

Guest said in an emailed statement:

The Consumer Product Safety Commission is absolutely critical to ensuring the safety of thousands of products in the marketplace. When it comes to product safety, the CPSC is the cop on the beat. We've got to have them. At Consumer Reports we recently did a national poll that found Americans strongly support the federal government’s role in protecting people from unsafe consumer products. The overwhelming majority of respondents – 98 percent – agreed that the federal government should play a prominent role in improving product safety. 82 percent strongly agreed the federal government should require testing by manufacturers of children's products to ensure they do not contain any harmful substances. That's why we have a CPSC, and that's why we need them.

And a policy counsel for Public Citizen called the proposed amendment "outrageous" in an email, adding that his group "and other consumer groups have been working to fight attempts to defund the new product safety database that was authorized by the bipartisan product safety law passed in 2008. Sen. Paul apparently isn't content with just preventing the creation of a database that allows consumers to see which products are unsafe; he wants to prevent all inspections, enforcement, and guidance from the CPSC; eliminate recalls of dangerous products; and require parents to bet their children's lives when they buy a crib or toy."

Previously, Paul had suggested slashing spending at the agency but his position has obviously hardened in recent weeks.