After taking the oath of office and delivering a stirring inaugural address from the heart of the Capitol Rotunda on Monday, President Donald Trump wasted no time in setting his ambitious policy agenda into motion. At a rally immediately following the inauguration and from the Oval Office late into the night, Trump’s second term started with a flurry of executive actions making good on many of his most important campaign promises.
In total, the White House website lists a whopping 46 presidential actions taken on January 20, including 26 executive orders, 12 memorandums, four proclamations, and four appointment announcements. The sheer number and scope of the actions immediately set the tone for Trump’s second term and made clear that the 45th and 47th president was coming back to the White House with a strategic, disciplined governing plan.
For his first policy-related executive order, with a single stroke of his iconic big Sharpie, Trump rescinded 78 Biden-era orders, including Biden’s orders which infused DEI throughout the federal government, created an electric vehicle mandate, blocked oil and gas exploration, and allowed more federal employees to telework instead of coming into the office.
Trump’s most headline-grabbing action was his sweeping pardon for January 6 defendants. Roughly 1,500 people were freed as a result, many of whom have alleged unjust treatment in Washington D.C. prisons over the past four years.
The new president’s most noteworthy policy focus on day one was the border, as he spared no effort in taking steps to end the unprecedented flood of illegal aliens and deadly drugs into the country.
In addition to declaring a national emergency at the southern border, Trump promptly terminated every Biden-Harris executive order that generated the worst border crisis in American history. He ordered officials at the Department of Homeland Security to deport illegal aliens with orders of removal, enhanced federal vetting standards for migrants, paused the Refugee Admissions Program, halted operations of the controversial “CBP One” mobile app that streamlined illegal entries, ended the practice of catch and release, resumed the “Remain in Mexico” program, restarted border wall construction, and designated drug cartels and transnational gangs as foreign terrorist organizations.
In other words, every Biden executive action that precipitated the worst border crisis in history is now gone, and border enforcement agents once again have the support of the White House in enforcing immigration law.
Relatedly, Trump also signed an executive order ending birthright citizenship, long considered a major factor in encouraging illegal immigration. Specifically, the order directs federal agencies to deny U.S. citizenship to children born in the U.S. to parents who are not lawful permanent residents.
In the realm of energy independence, Trump signed an order declaring a national energy emergency, as well as orders rescinding federal policies restricting American energy production, overriding Biden’s electric vehicle mandate, reopening certain areas in Alaska for oil and gas exploration, and withdrawing from the controversial Paris climate agreement.
Trump also took a wide slate of steps to fulfill his promise of draining the Washington Swamp and restoring a government of, by, and for the American people. As he unveiled following his November 5 victory, Trump formally created the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) to crack down on waste. He also signed orders reforming the federal hiring process to prioritize merit, making it easier to fire rogue bureaucrats.
In two equally important actions, Trump also instituted a hiring freeze and regulatory freeze to stop the relentless growth of the federal workforce and maze of bureaucratic red tape that had sprung up under Biden.
To advance his America First foreign policy approach, Trump signed orders withdrawing the United States from the World Health Organization, “putting America first in international environmental agreements,” and directing the Secretary of State to “issue guidance bringing the Department of State’s policies, programs, personnel, and operations in line with an America First foreign policy.”
Other orders were aimed at ending the weaponization of the federal government to target political opponents, restoring freedom of speech in the halls of our government, and reversing the Biden administration’s long list of executive actions that championed DEI.
In perhaps his most important action on the culture war front, Trump signed an order on “defending women from gender ideology extremism and restoring biological truth to the federal government.” In a devastating blow to proponents of gender ideology, that order clearly states that “it is the policy of the United States to recognize two sexes, male and female.” Furthermore, “these sexes are not changeable and are grounded in fundamental and incontrovertible reality.”
Also in his first hours as the 47th president, Trump signed a memorandum to deliver emergency price relief for American families, as well as an order to bring back the death penalty.
And to top it all off, Trump signed an order restoring the name of the highest peak in the United States to Mount McKinley and renaming the Gulf of Mexico the Gulf of America.
If the energy of Trump’s first day in office was any indication, he is only just getting started. The president is widely expected to continue his slate of historic executive orders and policy actions continuing throughout the week—honoring his contract with American voters and fulfilling his bold array of campaign promises.
“After all we have been through together, we stand on the verge of the four greatest years in American history,” Trump declared in his inaugural remarks. “With your help, we will restore American promise and we will rebuild the nation that we love.”
Aaron Flanigan is a contributor to AMAC Newsline.
