Pipeline safety enforcement cut in half in Trump’s first year

The Trump administration slashed pipeline safety enforcement in 2025, bringing about half the average number of cases as in previous years.

The change reduces pressure on an industry that includes some of President Donald Trump’s biggest financial supporters and sits at the center of his “energy dominance” agenda. It’s also part of a broader retreat across the federal government from policing companies’ environmental, safety and financial activities.

“In an administration with a president who has emphasized, as this one has, that he thinks there is too much regulation, reducing enforcement activity is an easy and unreviewable way to lessen immediate regulatory burdens,” said Cary Coglianese, a law professor at the University of Pennsylvania who heads the Penn Program on Regulation.

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