YourVoice.Now Summary
Transparency & AccountabilityCivil LibertiesWorkers & JobsTargeted & Unrelated ProvisionsAs few as four printed copies of each federal document would have to survive, but online access would be free by law.
Transparency & Accountability
At least once a year, the office would have to post a list online. It would name any public information taken out of the collection or off the website, and say why. No such rule exists today.
The 1993 law let the office charge fees for online access. The bill would replace it with a duty to give the public this material at no charge, and it defines lasting access as access without charge.
Today the President can shut off Federal Register filing and printing during an attack, or a threat of one. The bill would drop that power. The office would have to find another way to publish until normal service returns.
Today some libraries must keep federal documents forever. That covers regional libraries. It also covers any library with no regional library nearby. The bill would let them throw out what they do not want. The office would write the rules.
A new section would set the floor at four printed copies of each document sent to libraries. They would sit in four regions. Today up to two libraries in every state must each keep a copy.
Today the printing office may skip bidding only if it writes down facts that clearly show bidding is not practical, signs off on them, and keeps the record for six years. Section 306 deletes all of that.
The same section raises the amount the office can spend without asking for bids from $100,000 to $350,000. It also removes the written-reason rule, so the two changes stack.
The 1993 law being repealed names two records that must be online: the Congressional Record and the Federal Register. Its repeal also ends an online directory. It ends a duty to ask users what they need. And it ends a report to Congress every two years.
Civil Liberties
A new rule would set a floor for how the office protects people who use its online library. The floor is the Privacy Act of 1974 and the E-Government Act of 2002. There is no such rule for that site today.
Workers & Jobs
Senior-level staff at the Government Publishing Office would move to the 720-hour yearly leave ceiling that some other senior federal jobs already use. The normal ceiling is 240 hours.
Targeted & Unrelated Provisions
A repealed law lets the VA print and bind its own work on gear in VA hospitals and homes. That gear is run as part of therapy programs. Section 302 repeals it in a list of five, with no reason given.
More about this bill
If you look up an old federal document, fewer printed copies would be sure to exist. Today, up to two libraries in each state must keep one copy of every federal document. Libraries with no regional library nearby must keep their copies forever. This bill would let those libraries throw out documents they do not want. The new floor for the whole country would be four printed copies, spread across four regions. The Congressional Record is handled on its own. A committee, not the law, would decide who gets free printed copies. Libraries would still get the copies they require. Online access would get stronger in some ways. A 1993 law that allows fees for online access would be repealed. In its place, the public would get these documents online at no charge. The Government Publishing Office would have to post a yearly list of what it takes offline, and why. It would also have to protect users' privacy at the level the Privacy Act sets. But that same repeal drops the rule that the Congressional Record and Federal Register must be online. The daily index of the Federal Register would no longer be required. And the President would lose the power to halt the Federal Register during an attack. The bill also gives that office more room to buy without bids. It could award contracts up to $350,000 without asking for bids, up from $100,000. It would no longer have to write down why it skipped bidding, or keep that record for six years. The Joint Committee on Printing would get a new name. Its power to fix problems would cover only the work of Congress. Other changes are smaller. The price of a document for sale is now set by law at cost plus 50 percent. The office would set that price itself. Senior staff could bank 720 hours of unused leave instead of 240. And the VA would lose its power to print on gear used in veterans' hospital therapy.
Congressional Summary
Congress's official summary of this bill still describes an earlier version of the text, so we have left it out here. You can read it on Congress.gov.
Legislative Subjects
Details
- Congress
- 119th
- Chamber
- House
- Status
- summarized
- Action
- Passed House
- Action Date
- 2026-09-14
- Date Added
- 2026-09-09
- Source
- Congress.gov →
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