EXECUTIVE POLICYMAKING
Presidents use executive policymaking to achieve their policy goals administratively. Directives are an important tool of executive policymaking that presidents use to instruct the executive branch to act. This section shows how in their directives, presidents delegate authority and assign tasks to executive agencies and departments to carry out their policy goals.
WHAT IS EXECUTIVE POLICYMAKING?
Article II of the U.S. Constitution establishes the Executive Branch of the federal government. In Section 1, Clause 1, the federal executive power is vested in the President. As the Chief Executive Officer of the United States, presidents are at the pinnacle of the executive branch and the executive policymaking process.
Delegating Authority
Constitutional Authority
Article II, Section 1 of the U.S. Constitution vests executive power in the President of the United States. Section 2 gives the President the role of Commander in Chief; the authority to grant pardons for federal offenses; the power to receive ambassadors and other public ministers; and treaty-making and appointment powers the President shares with the Senate. While Section 3 requires the President to give Congress information on the state of the union, it also authorizes the President to recommend legislative measures to Congress. There are three examples below that show how Presidents have delegated their constitutional authority to officials within the executive branch.
Statutory Authority
Article I of the U.S. Constitution exclusively vests lawmaking in Congress while Article II. Section 3 vests the President with the execution. Although Congress cannot delegate its lawmaking power to the executive branch, it instructs the President and the departments and agencies within the executive branch on how to execute the law. With the responsibility for executing thousands of laws, Presidents delegate their authority as well as clarify how laws will be interpreted by the executive branch. There are three examples below that show how Presidents have delegated their statutory authority and clarified how to interpret the law.
How Presidents Delegate Their Constitutional Authority
Executive Power vested in the President
Relying on his executive power as President of the United States, Nixon issued EO 11472 on May 28, 1969 to create the Environmental Quality Council with the responsibility for ensuring that federal policies and programs adequately considered the environmental effects of their plans and programs. President Nixon adopted the Council’s recommendations for consolidating federal environmental responsibilities into a single agency thereby laying the groundwork for the Environmental Protection Agency.
Pardon Power
On January 21, 1977, shortly after President Carter issued Proclamation 4463, pardoning Vietnam draft violators, he issued EO 11967, delegating his pardon authority to the Attorney General to dismiss all indictments and investigations for violators eligible for pardon pursuant to Proclamation 4463.
Commander in Chief
Every two years the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff initiate a review of the Unified Command Plan (UCP). a classified document that outlines the missions, responsibilities, and geographic areas of responsibility for U.S. combatant commands. On May 23, 2025, President Trump as Commander in Chief, issued a Memorandum to the Secretary of Defense that approved and directed the implementation of the revised 2022 UCP and authorized the Secretary to notify Congress on the President’s behalf.
How Presidents Delegate Their Statutory Authority
Multiple Statutes
President George Bush consolidated multiple statutory delegations of authority to various officials for a variety of functions within a single EO. He issued EO 12781 Delegation of Functions and Authorities, Development of Requirements and Regulations, and Correction on November 20, 1991. In the EO, he delegated his authority in the Financial Reports Act of 1988 to conduct discussions with foreign governments on U.S. banking and financial organizations to the Secretary of the Treasury. In the same EO he delegated his authority in the Immigration and Nationality Act concerning a national employment verification system (E-Verify) to the Attorney General, Finally, he delegated his authority in Title 10 of the United States Code concerning the development of requirements and regulations for a uniform military ration to the Secretary of Defense.
Trade Laws
President Obama chose to issue EO 13733 Delegation of Certain Authorities and Assignment of Certain Functions Under the Trade Facilitation and Trade Enforcement Act of 2015 on July 22, 2016. In the EO he delegated some of the President’s specific functions and assignments under the Trade Facilitation and Trade Enforcement Act of 2015 to the Secretary of Commerce, Secretary of State, Secretary of the Treasury, and the United States Trade Representative.
Conditional Authority
Congress may delegate authority that requires certain conditions must be met before the President can take action. Section 232 of the Trade Expansion Act allows the President to impose restrictions on imports to the United States if the U.S. Secretary of Commerce determines, after an investigation, that those imports could impair U.S. national security. President Trump cited his authority under Section 232 when he issued EO 14223 Addressing the Threat to National Security From Imports of Timber, Lumber, and Their Derivative Products on March 1, 2025. In the EO, he commanded the Secretary of Commerce to conduct an investigation and to consult with the Secretary of Defense and other impacted departments and agencies, to determine the effects of those imports and their derivative on U.S. national security.
Assigning Tasks
Presidents assign different tasks depending on their objectives. When presidents request that studies be conducted, they generally require reports be produced that evaluate findings and make recommendations. Presidents may request the development of plans for new programs or the evaluation of existing ones to determine their effectiveness. Requiring agencies to provide advice and guidance provides policy interpretation and direction for others to follow. Presidents may assign more formal and long-lasting tasks including the development of rules and regulations that require agencies to adhere to the principles and requirements of the Administrative Procedure Act (APA). Read some examples of these tasks in the sections below.
-
Reagan
Presidents may assign the development of recommendations and reports to their presidential advisory commissions as President Reagan did when he issued EO 12308 on June 5, 1981, establishing a Presidential Task Force on the Arts and Humanities. The task force was formed to study how to increase private support and participation in the arts and humanities was required to report its findings and recommendations to the President, the Chairman of the National Endowment for the Arts, and the Chairman of the National Endowment for the Humanities.
Clinton
When President Clinton issued EO 12898 on February 11, 1994, to address environmental justice he established an Interagency Presidential Advisory Working Group that would use the reports of Federal agencies as input for their report to the President on on final environmental justice strategies.
-
Carter
President Carter initiated his national effort to promote women owned businesses when he issued EO 12138 on May 18, 1979 establishing an Iinteragency Advisory Committee on Women’s Business Enterprise. The Advisory Committee was responsible for developing, coordinating and implementing a national program for women's business enterprise and coordinating and monitoring the plans, programs and operations of executive branch departments and agencies. The programs created the guideposts and the plans established the guidelines the departments and agencies followed.
George Bush
As part of his national effort to expand opportunities for faith-based and other community organizations, President George W. Bush issued EO 13198 on January 29, 2001 establishing Centers for Faith-Based and Community Initiatives within five executive (Cabinet) departments. They were tasked with the development of innovative pilot and demonstration programs to increase participation in federal, state, and local initiatives.
-
Nixon
Executive departments and agencies convey their knowledge and interpretation of policy through the dissemination of advice and guidance. President Nixon sought agency guidance from the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) when he issued EO 11602 on June 29, 1971. In the EO, he ordered the EPA to circulate the names of all facilities who had been convicted of offenses under the Clean Air Act Amendments of 1970 to prohibit federal agencies from providing any federal assistance until they had been removed from the list.
Clinton
President Clinton sought technical guidance from the Department of Energy when he issued EO 12902 on March 8, 1994. He ordered the Secretary of Energy and the Administrator of General Services to study and issue a report on energy efficiency systems and their applications in the building industry which the Office of Federal Procurement Policy could then use to develop agency guidance for reducing energy consumption.
-
Trump
Executive departments and agencies create regulations or rules relying o authority delegated from the President or Congress. President Trump issued EO 13877 on June 24, 2019 ordering the Secretary of Health and Human Services (HHS) to implement his national program to improve healthcare transparency by proposing regulations mandating that hospitals post standard charge information. The Secretaries of HHS, the Treasury, and Labor were ordered to solicit comment in an advance notice of proposed rulemaking that would require healthcare providers to publish information about expected out-of-pocket costs before they receive care. The Secretary of the Treasury was mandated to issue regulations that would treat some healthcare services as eligible medical expenses.
Biden
President Biden issued EO 14110 on October 30, 2023 to ensure the safe and reliable development and use of artificial intelligence (AI) authorizing the Secretary of Commerce to promulgate rules and regulations governing foreign transactions with a U.S. AI providers.
Management & Oversight
White House
Presidents maintain accountability for the execution of their directive by delegating the management to White House advisers who report directly to the President.
Carter
On September 30, 1977, President Carter issued a Memorandum to the heads of executive departments and agencies informing them that he had established a World Hunger Working Group that would be led by his Special Assistant, Peter Bourne, who would represent the Working Group in the yet to be formed Cabinet Level Committee on Food and Agricultural Policy.
Bush
Presidents may choose to maintain oversight by establishing a Presidential Advisory Committee within an executive department. President Bush chose this method when he issued EO 12677 on April 28, 1989 establishing the President's Board of Advisors on Historically Black Colleges and Universities (HBCUs) within the Department of Education giving the Board the responsibility of supervising the annual development of the federal program designed to increase HBCU participation in federally sponsored programs.
Executive Office of the President
Presidents also rely on the Executive Office of the President (EOP) for providing oversight and management for the implementation of their directives. The EOP houses the White House staff, key advisers to the President, and the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) which is the centralized clearinghouse for implementing the President’s budget and policy.
Carter
One of President Carter’s goals was the use of zero-base budgeting, a system that required executive departments and agencies to create new budgets annually rather than revising the previous year’s requests. In his Memorandum on Zero-Base Budgeting issued on April 14, 1978, he noted that he had concluded that agencies lacked sufficient guidance, and ordered OMB to issue revised guidelines to improve the process for the 1980 Budget that OMB would manage.
Trump
Deregulation is a priority for President Trump 2.0 administration. In order to increase the efficiency of deregulation, iciency at the office of the Federal Register, President Trump issued EO 14295 on May 9, 2025, to reform the administrative process of removing a regulation from the Code of Federal Regulations through rulemaking. He ordered the Office of the Federal Register to work with the Director of the Government Publishing Office to reduce publication delays and to submit a report to the Director of OMB containing updated publication times for different categories of documents.