President Donald Trump’s recent executive order aimed at reducing regulatory criminal prosecutions reflects a distorted reality in which a draconian regulatory regime is supposedly turning ordinary Americans into unwitting criminals, legal experts said this week.
The order signed Friday—titled “Fighting Overcriminalization in Federal Regulation”—stated that enforcement of criminal regulatory offenses, as well as strict liability offenses, are “disfavored.” The order added that its goal is to “ease the regulatory burden on everyday Americans and ensure no American is transformed into a criminal for violating a regulation they have no reason to know exists.”