The Trump administration is recombining two federal agencies that officials split apart in the wake of the 2010 Deepwater Horizon oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico, according to a published report from The Hill.

The merger would reverse one of the most significant structural reforms adopted after the April 20, 2010, Deepwater Horizon blowout. The Transocean-operated rig explosion killed 11 workers and released an estimated 4.9 million barrels of crude into the Gulf over 87 days — the largest marine oil spill in U.S. history.

What agencies are being recombined?

In June 2010, two months after the blowout, then-Secretary of the Interior Ken Salazar announced the dismantling of the Minerals Management Service (MMS). MMS had combined three responsibilities under one roof: offshore leasing, safety and environmental enforcement, and mineral revenue collection.

Salazar split the agency into three entities effective October 2011:

• Bureau of Ocean Energy Management (BOEM) — leasing and resource evaluation
• Bureau of Safety and Environmental Enforcement (BSEE) — inspections, permitting, and enforcement
• Office of Natural Resources Revenue (ONRR) — royalty collection

The National Commission on the BP Deepwater Horizon Oil Spill and Offshore Drilling had recommended the split, concluding that MMS had become "systematically compromised" by industry relationships.

Why does this matter for Gulf operators?

The Gulf of Mexico federal Outer Continental Shelf produces roughly 1.9 million barrels of crude oil per day, making it the most productive offshore basin in the United States.

Federal offshore oversight touches every phase of activity on the shelf: lease sale design and auction, exploration plan review, drilling permit issuance, production safety inspections, and decommissioning of aging infrastructure.

Splitting MMS introduced review steps at the leasing-permitting interface but created dedicated safety and environmental teams. Recombining those functions under one roof collapses the timeline and consolidates responsibility for regulators and the industry operators they oversee.

What's the push for change?

Industry groups including the National Ocean Industries Association (NOIA) and the American Petroleum Institute (API) have long argued that the BSEE-BOEM structure layers redundant review on top of lease sale approvals. They contend a single agency could compress the gap between federal lease auctions and the drilling permits that translate leases into production.

Environmental and former-MMS reform advocates counter that the post-Macondo separation was a deliberate firewall against regulatory capture, and that consolidation would weaken the independent safety oversight created in direct response to the disaster.

What to watch

• Statutory mechanism — whether the merger runs through existing Department of the Interior reorganization authority, an executive order, or a new statute from Congress
• Regulatory carryover — whether existing frameworks including the Well Control Rule, SEMS II, and BSEE's incident reporting regime carry into the consolidated structure or face revision
• Regional footprint — BSEE currently operates regional offices in Houston and New Orleans that serve Gulf operators. Their combined placement will shape industry access
• Lease program timing — the Five-Year OCS Oil and Gas Leasing Program for 2024–2029 is in active implementation. The merger could affect the schedule for future sales and any deferred lease decisions
• Comment window — operators typically file detailed comments on restructuring proposals through API and NOIA. The comment-period calendar will set the next round of operator positioning