The simple version

A federal rule on how a vehicle's price is presented and what gets added to it was completed and published at the start of 2024.

Its start date was postponed a month later while it was contested, and it later fell on how it had been made.

The agency has since rescinded it. People still point to it as protection, which is why the sequence is worth knowing.

The numbers

• The rule was published at 89 FR 590 on January 4, 2024 and occupied 16 CFR Part 463 (Federal Trade Commission, final rule, 91 FR 6507, February 12, 2026)
• On February 22, 2024 the Commission delayed the effective date during the pendency of the legal challenge (same notice)
• The notice records that the delay document said the Commission would publish a new effective date once the court resolved the merits of the challenge (same notice)
• On January 27, 2025 the Fifth Circuit found the Commission had violated its own regulations by failing to issue an advance notice of proposed rulemaking, found the error was not harmless, and vacated the rule. The decision is Nat'l Auto. Dealers Ass'n v. FTC, 127 F.4th 549 (5th Cir. 2025) (same notice)
• The February 2026 notice withdraws the rule and is effective February 12, 2026 (same notice)
• The same notice separately removes a non-compete rule codified at 16 CFR Part 910 from the Code of Federal Regulations (same notice)
• Scope note: the notice does not state whether the rule ever took effect, and this article asserts neither that it did nor that it did not. It describes only 16 CFR Part 463 and the notice withdrawing it, and names no state law and no other federal rule that may apply to vehicle sales

Why a published rule can still never apply

Publishing a rule and having it apply to anyone are two separate steps. Between them sits a start date, and a start date can be moved.

Here the agency moved it during the legal challenge, and said a new one would be announced once that challenge was decided.

What ended the rule was how it had been made rather than what it said. The recorded finding was that a required earlier step had been missed.

The actual sequence in four dates

January 4, 2024, published. February 22, 2024, start date postponed while it was contested.

January 27, 2025, it was struck down. February 12, 2026, rescinded, effective the same day.

That is a little over two years from publication to removal. On the record of this notice, the start date never arrived in between.

What this means

If somebody tells you a federal rule governs dealer add-ons and advertised pricing, the rule with that name is no longer on the books.

The notice withdrew rather than replaced, so nothing took its place in that part. Other law may still apply to a vehicle purchase, and this article does not survey it.

The general lesson travels. A rule that has been published is not the same as a rule in force, and the gap between those two can last years.

What this is NOT

This article explains the published history and current status of one federal rule, using the Federal Trade Commission's own final rule at 91 FR 6507, published February 12, 2026, as the source for every date and citation. It is not legal advice and it is not a statement of anyone's rights at a dealership. It takes no position on whether the rule should have been adopted, on the decision that ended it, or on the withdrawal. The notice does not state whether the rule ever took effect, so this article asserts neither that it did nor that it did not, and says only that the notice records a postponed start date and a promised new one that it does not report being announced. The characterisations of the procedural failure and of the vacatur are the agency's own wording in its notice rather than ours. The only arithmetic is the span from January 4, 2024 to February 12, 2026, described as a little over two years. Other federal and state law may apply to vehicle advertising and add-on charges, and this article names none of it and does not survey it. This is not a political endorsement or criticism of anyone.

Sources

• Federal Trade Commission, "Revision of the Negative Option Rule, Withdrawal of the CARS Rule, Removal of the Non-Compete Rule To Conform These Rules to Federal Court Decisions," final rule, 91 FR 6507, February 12, 2026, via govinfo, read October 13, 2026