More than 70 agencies on the Federal Register no longer exist

Donald Trump promised to trim back the federal government, including closing redundant agencies and uprooting weaponized offices. Although the chainsaw has been on since day one of his second term, any initiative to reform the state faces a problem: no one knows with certainty how many stems the government has.

Some of the agencies and departments are so well known to the American public, and even internationally, that their acronyms are enough to recognize them: CIA, FBI, FEMA.... In the case of others, however, doubts begin to arise. What is the ACF, and what about NIAMS?

Both the Administration for Children and Families (ACF) and the National Institute of Arthritis and Musculoskeletal and Skin Diseases (NIAMS) are part of the federal undergrowth that even the government itself is unaware of, as shown by the inconsistencies between official sources and errors within the most cited, such as the Federal Register.

More than... At least...

"I was once in a meeting with a new agency that was being formed, but it didn’t have a name yet," Elon Musk wrote on X late last year. Why didn't it have a name? "All the good acronyms were taken!"

Chosen by Trump to head the office at the forefront of state cuts, Musk stated then that there were "well over 400 Federal agencies." 450, 500, 900? In truth, no one knows. Phrases like "more than" or "at least" are the norm when talking about the number of agencies and departments.

In 2017, government regulation expert Clyde Wayne Crews Jr. compiled estimates produced by official sources on the number of federal branches. The numbers range from 61 for the Unified Federal Regulatory and Deregulatory Actions Program to 443 for USA.gov.

In addition to providing those figures for Forbes, Crews Jr. pointed to other unknowns opened up by the nonexistence of a "authoritative" list. If you don't know how many agencies there are, for example, you also don't know the number of federal employees. It is also more difficult to monitor government spending.

Clyde Wayne Crews Jr. wrote that article just into Trump's first term. Little has changed since then, according to him. "No one knows how many agencies there are; nor, especially how many programs there are," he wrote in November of last year. "Afuera!" he added in Spanish, replicating the catchphrase ("Out!") used by Argentine President Javier Milei, known for his policy of state cuts.

The unknown figure is framed in background debates about the power of the federal government, the advancement of federal agencies over congressional powers and citizens’ right to know the state they are funding.

The most trusted list, the least trusted list: The Federal Register

One of the most frequently used catalogs is that of the Federal Register, the federal government's daily newsletter. It contains information on proposed rules, executive orders, presidential documents... and federal agencies (a list with information such as meeting minutes, regulations and basic information such as their purpose).

Listed there is the International Development Cooperation Agency (IDCA), created in 1979 to coordinate foreign aid dispensed by agencies such as USAID. Although it was abolished before it reached its 20th birthday, it is still listed in the Federal Register (although the Federal Register acknowledges that its staff was cleared by the Reagan administration and the agency abolished in 1998).

The OFR, as it is known by its acronym, works on a daily basis: it updates the official bulletin every day at 6 a.m., Monday through Friday, except for federal holidays. However, the IDCA, defunct more than 27 years ago, is not the only “fossil“ enumerated in the Federal Register, overseen by a specific office (Office of the Federal Register).

‘Unknown, no evidence it exists’

The NGO Open the Books found as many as 75 entities in the federal database that had "expired, disappeared, been terminated, been privatized, or merged into other agencies." It was the fate, for example, of the Amtrak Reform Council ("ended in 2002 after producing a plan"), as well as the Defense Base Closure and Realignment Commission ("still exists but unused since 200") or the United States Information Agency ("Absorbed by Department of State").

Others are shrouded in mystery: "unknown, no evidence it exists," contends Open the Books about the status of the Northeast Interstate Low-Level Radioactive Waste Commission. "No updates since 2000," it notes regarding the Emergency Steel Guarantee Loan Board.

There is also at least one redundancy. The Broadcasting Board of Governors (BBG) has been "called US Agency for Global Media since 2018" (or USAGM), the nonprofit's researchers write. A quick check by VOZ shows that USAGM is also listed in the Federal Register. One agency, two names. And two acronyms, the new agency Musk teased about might start looking there.

'Delete, delete, delete'

If the Office of the Federal Register heeds the Open the Books report, its official roster would consist of 336 agencies.

Learn which agencies to delete by accessing the full listing, called “Delete, Delete, Delete”: