Just Say No to Low-Flow Showerheads
While everyone is focused on tariffs, Trump is working to deregulate the economy.
“Low flow? Well, I don’t like the sound of that,” a skeptical Cosmo Kramer replied after hearing the news that his apartment’s superintendent was having the showerheads changed. That classic “Seinfeld” episode hilariously illustrated a very real problem President Donald Trump hopes to fix.
Indeed, Kramer’s fears came true. “These showers are horrible!” he indignantly hollers to Jerry Seinfeld as they both stand there with greasy, matted hair. “There’s no pressure! I can’t get the shampoo out of my hair!” Eventually, Jerry, Kramer, and Newman turn to a guy selling black-market showerheads out of the trunk of his car.
Leave it to government bureaucrats to make comedy not very funny in real life.
Fortunately, the president has a great sense of humor and a plan to fix the problem. “I like to take a nice shower to take care of my beautiful hair,” Trump joked as he prepared to sign an executive order on the subject. “I have to stand in the shower for 15 minutes until it gets wet. It comes out — drip, drip, drip. It’s ridiculous. And what you do is you end up washing your [hair] five times longer.”
🚨 @POTUS signs an Executive Order to end the Obama-Biden war on water pressure and Make America’s Showers Great Again pic.twitter.com/NO4qaOj0xv
— Rapid Response 47 (@RapidResponse47) April 9, 2025
Joe Biden waged what Trump called “a war on showers” by regulating the water pressure of showerheads and other appliances, and Trump just reversed it. Again. He had reversed Barack Obama’s similar regulations during his first term, so as he reversed it this time, he noted that he’s hoping to get Congress on board with making it more permanent. Technically, Trump is restoring the regulation to the 2.5 gallons per minute limit set by a 1992 energy law — hence that 1996 “Seinfeld” episode.
Naturally, the Biden administration pointed to climate change to justify this and many other shenanigans. “As many parts of America experience historic droughts,” said Biden Energy Department official Kelly Speakes-Backman, “this commonsense proposal means consumers can purchase showerheads that conserve water and save them money on their utility bills.”
If there were a narrator on this show, he’d pause here and say, It did not, in fact, save consumers money on their utility bills.
In February, Washington Post columnist Mark Lasswell wrote about a 2024 study that concluded, “Water consumption was reduced by up to 56% with high water pressure.” That’s likely because shower users change their behavior in response to poor performance from low-flow heads.
It’s not just showers. Heavy-handed regulations of many household appliances have left consumers with fewer choices at a higher cost — all for lower-performing and less reliable products. In a fact sheet, Trump’s White House said, “The Biden Administration aggressively targeted everyday appliances like gas stoves, water heaters, washing machines, furnaces, dishwashers, and more, waging war on the reliable tools Americans depend on daily. These appliances worked perfectly fine before Biden’s meddling piled on convoluted regulations that made those appliances worse. ”
Remember the gas stove debacle? Recall who made EVs a political issue? Biden’s entire plan was low energy and high cost.
Just this week, I’ve talked to two appliance repairmen who vouch for the decline in quality and durability caused by overregulation. I sold my last house in 2015, and it still had a fully functioning oven manufactured in 1953. In my current home, I’ve already replaced an oven that was 50 years newer.
Everyone reading this has had the same experience with modern appliances, wistfully recalling your old appliances. We all know a simple truth: They don’t make ‘em like they used to.
Why is that? It’s largely the fault of do-gooder bureaucrats operating at the behest of the ecofascists dictating Democrat presidential orders.
Fortunately, Trump isn’t just working to fix showerheads. As the White House said on Inauguration Day, “President Trump’s energy actions empower consumer choice in vehicles, showerheads, toilets, washing machines, lightbulbs and dishwashers.”
At Reason magazine, Marc Oestreich notes, “In February, Trump’s DOE postponed three Biden-era efficiency rules related to central A.C. and heat pumps, walk-in coolers and freezers, and gas tankless water heaters. It also carved a special regulatory category, freeing tankless heaters from Biden’s near-ban. Just last week, the DOE cut four more rules outright — impacting ceiling fans, dehumidifiers, external power supplies, and the electric motors that power almost everything.”
Trump is right that Congress must get involved for these welcome deregulatory moves to last. I blamed the Democrats above, but Ronald Reagan signed the National Appliance Energy Conservation Act of 1987, and George H.W. Bush signed the Energy Policy Act of 1992. Both Republicans bear some responsibility for their successors’ regulations based on those laws. It will happen again without better legislation.
Making America Great Again means getting the federal government out of your kitchen and bathroom.
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