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Administration and
agenda

OFFICE
VACANCY

Looking ahead to the Trump administration and a
Republican-controlled Congress, the focus will be on
Trump's top priorities: infrastructure, tax reform,
dismantling the Affordable Care Act (ACA), and
immigration reform. President-elect Trump highlighted
his commitment to infrastructure investment during his
victory speech early November 9. "We are going to fix our
inner cities and rebuild our highways, bridges, tunnels,
airports, schools, hospitals," he said. "We're going to
rebuild our infrastructure, which will become, by the way,
second to none. And we will put millions of our people to
work as we rebuild it." Trump would fund infrastructure
investment through public-private partnerships and
private investments through tax incentives rather than
tax reform, though he has called for early action on that
issue as well. On October 22, Trump outlined a voter
contract for his first 100 days plan that calls for
enactment of:

► The Middle Class Tax Relief And Simplification Act
(comprehensive tax reform);

► The End the Offshoring Act, to establish tariffs to
discourage companies from laying off their workers in
order to relocate in other countries and ship their
products back to the U.S. tax-free;

► The American Energy & Infrastructure Act, to leverage
public-private partnerships and private investments
through tax incentives to raise $1 trillion in
infrastructure investment over 10 years;

► The School Choice And Education Opportunity Act, to
expand primary education options and make college
more affordable;

► The Repeal and Replace Obamacare Act, to repeal the
ACA and replace it with Health Savings Accounts;

► The Affordable Childcare and Eldercare Act, to allow
Americans to deduct childcare and elder care;

► The End Illegal Immigration Act, to fund the
construction of a wall on the Mexican border;

► The Restoring Community Safety Act, to reduce crime;

► The Restoring National Security Act, to rebuild the
military by eliminating the defense sequester and
expanding military investment; and

► The Clean up Corruption in Washington Act, to enact
"new ethics reforms to Drain the Swamp and reduce
the corrupting influence of special interests on our
politics."

As part of the voter contract announced in October,
Trump has also pledged to act on his first day in office to
"cancel every unconstitutional executive action,
memorandum and order issued by President Obama."
Trump advisor Anthony Scaramucci said in October that
the new administration would repeal the rulemaking on
conflicts of interest in the delivery of investment advice to
IRA and 401(k) plan investors.

Regulations that have been finalized cannot be
unilaterally vacated by executive order without
intervening regulatory or legislative action. In order to
make changes to final regulations without legislative
action, agencies are typically required to follow the
administrative procedural process which requires a notice
and comment process prior to modifying regulations. If
an Administration wishes to repeal or revise a final
regulation through the administrative process, the agency
may be required to demonstrate that its actions are not
"arbitrary and capricious," and based on more than a
change in political views. It is possible that a new
Administration could dispense with the notice and
comment process by moving to issue an interim final rule,
replacing the previous regulation. In this situation, the
agency could be called on demonstrate that it acted with
"good cause" to circumvent the typical notice and
comment requirements.

A new Administration could also use its executive power
to affect the level of legal defense of challenges to
existing regulations provided by the Administration or
temporarily refuse to exercise its enforcement
responsibilities until compelled through legal action or
public pressure.

Trump also intends to immediately begin the process of
filling the Supreme Court vacancy created by the death of
Antonin Scalia in early 2016 - one that could spark
fireworks on Capitol Hill and across the country's highly
charged political environment. How Republicans,
Democrats, and Trump navigate through the process of
nominating and confirming a Justice to the Supreme
Court is likely to set the tone in the Senate for the next
two years.

Trump also intends to act on trade issues on his first day
in office, including:

► announcing his intention to renegotiate or withdraw
from NAFTA;

► announcing withdrawal from the Trans-Pacific
Partnership; and

EY

8 | Election 2016

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