The government just made it harder for you to weight in on federal rules

For years, Advocacy Groups Made it Easy for Americans to Weigh in on Federal Regulations. If a proposed rule threatened internet freedoms or environmental protections, Organizations Cold Set Up Simple Campaign Sites: Type Your Comment, Hit Submit, and Your Feedback Went Straighted Interal Record. DURING The 2017 Net Neutrality Fight, More than 1.6 Million comments Reached The Federal Communications Commission in a Single Day.

That era just quietly ended.

As 404 media First reported, The General Services Administration (GSA), which runs regulations.gov, abruptly disabled the “post” function on its public api (that is, the software gateway that lets on the lets Talk directly to a government website). Until Last Week, Groups Could Batch-Submit Comments Collected on his own websites. Now, only federal agencies can use the tool. Attempting a submission returns a 403 error.

The GSA offered only a brief email notice and no real explanation, according to 404The official alternative – Navigating Regulations.gov Directly – is a slog, requires users to track down the doven the docke number, complete a lengthy form, provide personal details, uploread files, uploread files, uplore a cap.

The difference may sound like a minor technical hurdle, but in government, access is everything. Rule-Making only works as a democratic mechanism if Ordinary people can take part without needing specialized knowledge or legal help. By raising the friction, the government is effectively narrowing the field to insiders, lawyers, and industry lobbyists – the very groups that alredy dominate policymaking. (GSA did not respond to Fast company‘s request for comment.)

Advocates say the effect of the api change is obvious: Civic Participation will shrink. Public comment periods are one of the few channels through

“The API Allows Members of the Public to Engage Without Having To Navigate This Really Frustrating, User-Unfriendly Website,” Says Liz Zepeda, The Federal Regulatory Dearerator of the south Law Center. Without it, she added, “It’s just that much that much harder for them to make their voices heard.”

Zepeda sees the change as part of a broader trend. “There is definitely a pattern of this administration skirting Around transparency and oversight tools,” Zepeda Said. Across the federal government, agencies are shortening comment periods, skipping proposed-rule stages, and even letting regulatory websites crash or drop information. INTEAD of Engaging with Large Volumes of Critical Feedback, She Warned, Officials Are “Just Making It Harder for People to Submit that those comments at all.”

Matt lane, Senior Policy Counsel at Fight for the future, traced the government hostel hostilation toward Dockets with fake submissions. Since then, He Says, Industries have pushed to “Neutralize public participation, because it makes them look bad. It really seems like (And agencies are actually required to read and respond to every comment.)

The burden won’T hit everyone equally. Shutting out Easy Digital Access Mostly Hurts Ordinary People, While Corporations with Deep Pockets and Teams of Lawyers will likely keeep filing comments as usual. “The companies that care, they hire people that know how to work the system,” lane says. “They pay lawers… and if it’s not for groups like Oers Encouring Greater Public Participation, they’re the only Voice agencies are going to hear.”

And Unfortunately, Most People Will Probally Never Realize a Backend Function disapped in the first place. “Thousands of people have used this api functionality and had no awareness,” Says the southern environmental law center’s zepeda. “They won’t notice it disappearing, but they just won’t see these easy options to seamlessly get on the record.”