Review - 2026 Unified Agenda – FAA and UAS

As I mentioned on Sunday, last week the Administration published their 2026 Unified Agenda. The DOT’s Agenda page lists 36 rulemakings from the Federal Aviation Administration. Five of those address uncrewed aircraft system (UAS) rulemakings. There are no DOT inactive rulemakings. There are just two completed FAA actions; neither of which deal with UAS regulations. 

Those five UAS rulemakings are: 

Commentary  

These five rulemakings related to UAS operations, even the fixed site designation rule, have the common thread of solidifying the place of uncrewed systems in the regulation of the national airspace. This will make counter UAS operations that much more complicated as law enforcement will have to contend with identifying whether a suspect UAS has a legal purpose in the airspace where it is operating. 

For more information on these five rulemakings, see my article at CFSN Detailed Analysis - https://patrickcoyle.substack.com/p/2026-unified-agenda-faa-and-uas - subscription required. 

Review - 2026 Unified Agenda – DHS

Yesterday, the Administration published their 2026 Unified Agenda. The Unified Agenda lays out the major regulatory measures that the Administration is considering taking action on over the next year. The listing of a rulemaking or the estimated action dates associated with a rulemaking are aspirational at best and no guarantee of agency action, especially since there will be a change in Administration in January. There are 59 active rulemakings listed for DHS with 30 rulemakings on the Long-Term Action list for the Department. There are 101 rulemakings listed in the Inactive Rule portion of the Agenda. Finally, DHS reported 21 rulemakings (none of particular interest here) on the Completed Actions portion of the Agenda. 

DHS Active Rulemakings  

The DHS portion of the Spring 2025 Unified Agenda lists 45 rulemakings, five of which I would expect to cover in this blog if/when actions are taken. Those rulemakings are: 

Commentary  

Federal agencies are required {5 USC 602(a)} to publish twice a year (specifically in April and October) a regulatory flexibility agenda that lists “any rule which the agency expects to propose or promulgate which is likely to have a significant economic impact on a substantial number of small entities”. Since the fall of 1995, OIRA has published a compilation of these as the Spring and Fall Unified Agenda respectively. The April and October requirement has slipped over the years with the current Administration publishing the Spring 2025 Unified Agenda in September 2025. With the removal of the seasonal designation from the current Unified Agenda, it seems that the Administration is announcing that they have no intention of publishing a second Unified Agenda this year. Hopefully, they intend to return to complying with statutory requirements in 2027. 

Review – Spring 2025 Unified Agenda – FAA UAS Rulemakings

 Last week the Trump Administration published their Spring 2025 Unified Agenda. The Department of Transportation portion of that Agenda lists 27 rulemakings (down from 35 in the Fall 2025 UA) being considered by the Federal Aviation Administration. Two of those rulemakings address the operations of uncrewed aircraft systems. Three additional rulemaking is listed under the FAA listings on the DOT long term agenda. The Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration (PHMSA) also has one UAS related rulemaking listed in the Unified Agenda.

Current Agenda

The Spring 2025 UA has two rulemakings listed that relate to the operation of unmanned aircraft systems (UAS):

 

For more information on the UAS related rulemakings in the Spring 2025 Unified Agenda, see my article at CFSN Detailed Analysis, see my article at CFSN Detailed Analysis - https://patrickcoyle.substack.com/p/spring-2025-unified-agenda-faa-uas - subscription required.

Review – Spring 2025 Unified Agenda – DHS Rulemakings

Thursday the Trump Administration published their Fall 2024 Unified Agenda. The Unified Agenda lays out the major regulatory measures that the Administration is considering taking action on over the next year. The listing of a rulemaking or the estimated action dates associated with a rulemaking are aspirational at best and no guarantee of agency action, especially since there will be a change in Administration in January. There are 45 rulemakings listed for DHS with 28 rulemakings on the Long-Term Action list for the Department. There are now 98 DHS rulemakings on the Inactive Actions list.

DHS Active Rulemakings

The DHS portion of the Spring 2025 Unified Agenda lists 45 rulemakings, only one of which would be covered here in this blog if/when any actions are taken. That rule making is:

Cyber Incident Reporting for Critical Infrastructure Act (CIRCIA) Reporting Requirements, 1670-AA04.

Commentary

The Unified Agenda is an ongoing exercise in trying to keep track of the regulatory efforts of the Federal Government. Given the fact that the Executive Branch does not have enough people to complete all of the detailed work on developing and amending the regulations directed by the President, Congress and the Courts, it is not surprising that the ‘expected’ dates for the next stage of the rulemaking process are largely aspirational, and not actual predictions that can be tracked for their forecasting accuracy. Still, it is the tool that we have.

The one area of Unified Agenda that is less aspirational is the Abstract listing for each rulemaking. This is the current summary of what the administration sees as the purpose and scope of the rulemaking. They contain little in the way of details, but they do provide some insight into how any current work is proceeding.

 

For more information on the DHS actions listed in the Spring 2025 Unified Agenda, see my article on CFSN Detailed Analysis - https://patrickcoyle.substack.com/p/spring-2025-unified-agenda-dhs-rulemakings - subscription required.

Review - Fall 2024 Unified Agenda – PHMSA HAZMAT

This is part of a continuing look at the Fall 2024 Unified Agenda that was published last week by the Biden Administration.

Fall 2024 Unified Agenda – DHS Rulemakings

Fall 2024 Unified Agenda – FAA and UAS

The DOT portion of the Unified Agenda lists 222 rulemakings for the Department. Of those, 28 rulemakings are associated with the DOT’s Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration (PHMSA). Hazardous Materials (HAZMAT) rules account for 15 of those rulemakings. There is one additional HAZMAT rulemaking listed in the DOT’s Long Range Actions portion of the Agenda.

Commentary

Trump’s nominee for DOT Secretary (still way too early for a PHMSA Administrator to be named), Sean Duffy (former congressman from Wisconsin), has some familiarity with the legislative and regulatory process, so I suspect that we will see DOT continue the rulemaking processes, especially those associated with updating regulatory requirements. People who work in government have a tendency to believe that the government has a duty to protect industry and/or the people; they would not be in government if that were not true.

The rules in the next four years will be more careful in their application of new costly mandates on industry. But, when necessary, regulators will be able to convince the political appointees to go along with necessary regulatory requirements.

 

For more information on these rulemakings, see my article at CFSN Detailed Analysis - https://patrickcoyle.substack.com/p/fall-2024-unified-agenda-e9f - subscription required.

Review - Fall 2024 Unified Agenda – FAA and UAS

Last week the Biden Administration published their Fall 2024 Unified Agenda. The Department of Transportation portion of that Agenda lists 35 rulemakings being considered by the Federal Aviation Administration. Four of those rulemakings address the operations of uncrewed aircraft systems. One additional rulemaking is listed under the FAA listings on the DOT long term agenda. The Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration (PHMSA) also has one UAS related rulemaking listed in the Unified Agenda.

Each individual rulemaking listed in the Unified Agenda has a link to a file about that proposed rule. That file includes such information as:

An abstract describing rulemaking,

CFR and USC citations for the proposed regulations,

Legal deadlines (which are seldom if ever enforced),

The aspirational timeline for the next step in the regulatory process, and

Point of contact information at the agency.

Commentary

I do not see anything in any of these rulemakings that would specifically run afoul of the anti-regulatory aspirations of the incoming Trump Administration. I would expect that there would be some minor differences in some of the details from what we would have seen if Harris had been elected. The big difference will be the timing; I would not expect a big push to quickly move any of these regulations across the finish line even though various industrial partners (especially the chemical process industry) will be pushing for the facility registration rulemaking. Still, the people surrounding Trump have a natural mistrust of government regulations, so quick movement is not to be expected.

 

For more information on the Fall 2024 Unified Agenda and the UAS, see my article at CFSN Detailed Analysis - https://patrickcoyle.substack.com/p/fall-2023-unified-agenda-faa-and-e3c - subscription required.

Review - Fall 2024 Unified Agenda – DHS Rulemakings

Yesterday the Biden Administration published their Fall 2024 Unified Agenda. The Unified Agenda lays out the major regulatory measures that the Administration is considering taking action on over the next year. The listing of a rulemaking or the estimated action dates associated with a rulemaking are aspirational at best and no guarantee of agency action, especially since there will be a change in Administration in January. There are 68 rulemakings listed for DHS with 33 rulemakings on the Long-Term Action list for the Department. Five of those rulemakings are of particular interest here:

Commentary

The Unified Agenda is an ongoing exercise in trying to keep track of the regulatory efforts of the Federal Government. Given the fact that the Executive Branch does not have enough people to complete all of the detailed work on developing and amending the regulations directed by the President, Congress and the Courts, it is not surprising that the ‘expected’ dates for the next stage of the rulemaking process are largely aspirational, and not actual predictions that can be tracked for their forecasting accuracy. With changes in administrations, especially the type change we are seeing this year, those expectations cannot even be called aspirational. Still, it is the tool that we have.

 

For more information on the details on the DHS rulemakings of interest, see my article at CFSN Detailed Analysis - https://patrickcoyle.substack.com/p/fall-2024-unified-agenda - subscription required.

Review - Spring 2024 Unified Agenda – FAA and UAS

Earlier this month the Biden Administration published their Spring 2024 Unified Agenda. The DOT portion of that Agenda includes 34 entries for rulemakings by the Federal Aviation Administration. Two of those rulemakings deal with unmanned aircraft systems (UAS) In the separate Long-Term Actions portion of the Unified Agenda the 15 listed FAA actions include three that address UAS issues.

For more details about these FAA UAS rulemakings, see my article at CFSN Detailed Analysis - https://patrickcoyle.substack.com/p/spring-2024-unified-agenda-fb1 - subscription required.

Review - Fall 2023 Unified Agenda – FAA and Drones

Yesterday the Biden Administration published their Fall 2023 Unified Agenda. The Unified Agenda lays out the major regulatory measures that the Administration is considering taking action on over the next year. The listing of a rulemaking or the estimated action dates associated with a rulemaking are aspirational at best and no guarantee of agency action. The FAA portion of the DOT Agenda contains 38 rulemakings, two of which refer to the regulation of uncrewed aircraft systems (UAS). There are additional 13 FAA rulemakings listed in the DOT’s Long-Term Agenda, one of which deals with UAS.

 

For more details on these UAS rulemakings, see my article at CFSN Detailed Analysis - https://patrickcoyle.substack.com/p/fall-2023-unified-agenda-faa-and - subscription required.

Review - Fall 2023 Unified Agenda – DHS

Yesterday the Biden Administration published their Fall 2023 Unified Agenda. The Unified Agenda lays out the major regulatory measures that the Administration is considering taking action on over the next year. The listing of a rulemaking or the estimated action dates associated with a rulemaking are aspirational at best and no guarantee of agency action. There are 81 rulemakings listed for DHS with 31 rulemakings on the Long-Term Action list for the Department.

 

For more details about the DHS portion of the Fall 2023 Unified Agenda, see my article at CFSN Detailed Analysis - https://patrickcoyle.substack.com/p/fall-2023-unified-agenda - subscription required.

Review - Spring 2023 Unified Agenda – DHS

Yesterday the Biden Administration published their Spring 2023 Unified Agenda). The Unified Agenda lays out the major regulatory measures that the Administration is considering taking action on over the next year. The listing of a rulemaking or the estimated action dates associated with a rulemaking are aspirational at best and no guarantee of agency action. There are 80 rulemakings listed for DHS with 33 rulemakings on the Long-Term Action list for DHS.

 

For more details about the Unified Agenda items of potential interest here, see my article at CFSN Detailed Analysis - https://patrickcoyle.substack.com/p/spring-2023-unified-agenda - subscription required.

Review - 2020 Fall Unified Agenda – DOT - PHMSA and HMR

This is part of a continuing look at the DOT portion of the 2022 Fall Unified Agenda that was published by the Biden Administration last week. The Pipeline and Hazardous Material Safety Administration (PHMSA) has 26 rulemakings listed in the latest version of the Unified Agenda. Thirteen of those listed rulemakings deal with the Hazardous Materials Regulations (HMR).

As I noted in an earlier post, the Unified Agenda lays out the major regulatory measures that the Administration is considering taking action on over the next year. The listing of a rulemaking or the estimated action dates associated with a rulemaking are aspirational at best and no guarantee of agency action.

My earlier posts on the 2022 Fall Unified Agenda include:

Fall 2022 Unified Agenda – DHS, and

2022 Fall Unified Agenda – DOT - FAA and Drones

HMR Rulemakings

Not all of these regulatory actions listed in the Unified Agenda would be covered in this blog if action were taken by PHMSA. I would expect to cover the following rulemakings:

Prerule Stage	Hazardous Materials: Regulatory Reform Initiatives and Reducing Unnecessary Burdens	2137-AF47
Proposed Rule Stage	Hazardous Materials: FAST Act Requirements for Real-Time Train Consist Information by Rail	2137-AF21
Proposed Rule Stage	Hazardous Materials: Advancing Safety of Highway, Rail, and Vessel Transportation	2137-AF41
Proposed Rule Stage	Hazardous Materials: Improving the Safety of Transporting Liquefied Natural Gas	2137-AF54
Final Rule Stage	Hazardous Materials: Suspension of HMR Amendments Authorizing Transportation of Liquefied Natural Gas by Rail	2137-AF55

 

For more details about these rulemakings, see my article at CFSN Detailed Analysis - https://patrickcoyle.substack.com/p/2020-fall-unified-agenda - subscription required.

Review - 2022 Fall Unified Agenda – DOT - FAA and Drones

As I noted earlier this week, the Biden Administration published the now misnamed 2022 Fall Unified Agenda. Instead of looking at Department of Transportation rulemakings en mass I will be looking at them from an issue perspective. First, I will look at the Federal Aviation Administration and unmanned aviation systems (UAS, or drones).

There are no rulemakings in the current Unified Agenda and there are six rulemakings listed Long-Term Agenda:

FAA	Registration and Marking Requirements for Small Unmanned Aircraft	2120-AK82
FAA	Unmanned Aircraft Systems Expanded Operations	2120-AL01
FAA	Safe and Secure Operations of Small Unmanned Aircraft Systems	2120-AL26
FAA	External Marking Requirement for Small Unmanned Aircraft	2120-AL32
FAA	Prohibit or Restrict the Operation of an Unmanned Aircraft in Close Proximity to a Fixed Site Facility	2120-AL33
FAA	Unmanned Aircraft Systems Operations Using Special Airworthiness	2120-AL82

No actions are being contemplated in the near term on the above listed rulemakings.

Commentary

The FAA continues to punt on its statutory requirement {PL 114-190 Section 2209 (130 STAT. 634)} to publish a rule to “establish a process to allow applicants to petition the Administrator of the Federal Aviation Administration to prohibit or restrict the operation of an unmanned aircraft in close proximity to a fixed site facility”. This was supposed to have been accomplished by January 11^th, 2017, now almost six years late.

Now this restricted airspace regulation would not solve the potential problem of UAS flying over or attacking critical infrastructure. There are still significant federal statutes and regulations that prohibit taking actions against aircraft that will have to be modified by Congress before protective actions can be taken. But, having said that, providing legal restrictions against UAS intruding on critical infrastructure would at least allow law enforcement to take actions against operators violating those restrictions.

For more details about these rulemakings, see my article at CFSN Detailed Analysis - https://patrickcoyle.substack.com/p/2022-fall-unified-agenda-dot-faa - subscription required.

Review - Fall 2022 Unified Agenda – DHS

Yesterday the Biden Administration published their Fall 2022 Unified Agenda (I know, it is no longer 2022 and it is no longer fall, but regulators have their own calendar). The Unified Agenda lays out the major regulatory measures that the Administration is considering taking action on over the next year. The listing of a rulemaking or the estimated action dates associated with a rulemaking are aspirational at best and no guarantee of agency action.

DHS Rulemakings

The DHS portion of the UA lists 87 rulemakings, eight of which will be covered here in this blog if/when any actions are taken on them. The table below shows those eight rulemakings.

OS	Proposed Rule	Homeland Security Acquisition Regulation: Information Technology Security Awareness Training (HSAR Case 2015-002)	1601-AA78
OS	Final Rule	Homeland Security Acquisition Regulation: Safeguarding of Controlled Unclassified Information (HSAR Case 2015-001)	1601-AA76
OS	Final Rule	Civil Monetary Penalty Adjustments For Inflation	1601-AB07
USCG	Proposed Rule	2022 Liquid Chemical Categorization Updates	1625-AC73
USCG	Proposed Rule	Cybersecurity in the Marine Transportation System	1625-AC77
USCG	Proposed Rule	TWIC--Reader Requirements; Second Delay of Effective Date	1625-AC80
TSA	Prerule	Enhancing Surface Cyber Risk Management	1652-AA74
TSA	Proposed Rule	Vetting of Certain Surface Transportation Employees	1652-AA69
CISA	Proposed Rule	Ammonium Nitrate Security Program	1670-AA00
CISA	Proposed Rule	Chemical Facility Anti-Terrorism Standards (CFATS)	1670-AA01

Long Term Agenda

There is a separate section of the Unified Agenda for rulemaking actions that are on the minds of agencies, but for which there is no current intention by those agencies to take action, the Long-Term Actions list. Rulemakings move back and forth between the Long-Term Actions list and the main Unified Agenda listing, sometimes without rhyme or reason. There are currently two rulemakings on the DHS list that would be covered here if the agencies were to act on those rulemakings.

DHS/OS	Department of Homeland Security Cybersecurity Talent Management System	1601-AA84
DHS/TSA	Surface Transportation Vulnerability Assessments and Security Plans	1652-AA56

 

For more details about these rulemakings, see my article at CFSN Detailed Analysis - https://patrickcoyle.substack.com/p/fall-2022-unified-agenda-dhs - subscription required.