On Feb. 18, the release of U.S. President Donald Trump's executive order titled "Ensuring accountability for all agencies" prompted the circulation of claims (archived) online to the effect that, following the order, only the U.S. president and attorney general can interpret the law.
For example, one X user wrote:
A Trump official just announced that Trump has signed an executive order claiming that ONLY the President and Attorney General can speak for "what the law is."
They are trying to start a constitutional crisis.
(@NoLieWithBTC / X)
The claim appeared with similar phrasings on X (archived), Facebook (archived), Reddit (archived), Threads (archived) and Bluesky (archived).
(@allenanalysis / X)
It's true that Trump's Feb. 18 executive order increased presidential oversight of federal agencies, in part by giving the president and attorney general control over executive branch agencies' interpretation of the law. Section 7 of the order reads:
The President and the Attorney General, subject to the President's supervision and control, shall provide authoritative interpretations of law for the executive branch.
Contrary to what was claimed in the social media posts above, the order only confers on the president and attorney general the authority to interpret matters of law for agencies within the executive branch. The order says those federal agencies must not "advance an interpretation of the law" that "contravenes the President or the Attorney General's opinion on a matter of law." This does not apply to the legislative or judicial branches of government. Therefore, we rate this claim a mixture of true and false.
The order applies, with certain exceptions, to all agencies classified as an "independent regulatory agency" under Title 44 of the U.S. Code, § 3502. It removes a measure of independence from lawyers working in those agencies, allowing the president and attorney general to dictate the issuance of regulations, guidance and positions advanced in litigation.
Section 7, as cited above, is just one of the ways that the "Ensuring accountability for all agencies" executive order seeks to make federal agencies more directly accountable to the president. The full order and a fact sheet about it are available on the White House website.