President Donald Trump began quickly implementing his agenda shortly after taking office on Monday by signing a slate of executive orders.
The first order he signed before a crowd at the Capital One Arena revoked approximately 80 executive actions that had been signed by former President Joe Biden. Trump signed even more orders after he returned to the White House after leaving the evening rally.
The orders are part of a broad plan that’s expected to include more than 50 items in total.
Here are several of the key actions:
Order directing attorney general to help states get lethal injection drugs
Trump signed a sweeping execution order on the death penalty, directing the attorney general to “take all necessary and lawful action” to ensure that states have enough lethal injection drugs to carry out executions.
Trump wrote that “politicians and judges who oppose capital punishment have defied and subverted the laws of our country.”
A moratorium on federal executions had been in place since 2021, and only three defendants remain on federal death row after Biden converted 37 of their sentences to life in prison.
Trump moves to withdraw the US from the World Health Organization — again
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One executive order begins the process of withdrawing the U.S. from the World Health Organization.
It was the second time in less than five years that he’s ordered the country to withdraw from the organization, despite it being a move many scientists fear could roll back decadeslong gains made in fighting infectious diseases like AIDS, malaria and tuberculosis.
Experts also warn it could weaken the world’s defenses against dangerous new outbreaks capable of triggering pandemics.
Executive order keeps TikTok online for now
TikTok will keep operating for 75 days, under an executive order signed Monday, bringing a relief to the social media platform’s users even as national security questions persist.
TikTok’s China-based parent company was supposed to find a U.S. buyer or be banned last weekend. Trump’s order gives them more time to find a buyer.
“I guess I have a warm spot for TikTok,” Trump said.
Biden declined to enforce the bipartisan measure that he signed into law, while Trump has pledged to keep TikTok open after crediting it for aiding his 2024 election victory. Trump’s legal authority to preserve TikTok is unclear under the terms of the law recently upheld by the U.S. Supreme Court.
Trump issues sweeping pardon of 1,500 Jan. 6 defendants
Trump pardoned or commuted the prison sentences of all of the 1,500-plus people charged with crimes in the Jan. 6, 2021, U.S. Capitol riot, including people convicted of seditious conspiracy and assaulting police officers, using his clemency powers on his first day in office to undo the massive prosecution of the unprecedented assault on the seat of American democracy.
Among those set to be released from prison are defendants captured on camera committing violent attacks on law enforcement as lawmakers met to certify President Joe Biden’s 2020 election victory. Leaders of the Oath Keepers and Proud Boys extremist groups who were found of seditious conspiracy in the most serious cases brought by the Justice Department will also be freed from prison after having their sentences commuted. Trump is directing the attorney general to seek the dismissal of about 450 pending cases.
Orders signed to remake border security
Trump signed executive orders to beef up security at the southern border that began taking effect hours after he was inaugurated, making good on his defining political promise to crack down on immigration and marking another wild swing in White House policy on the divisive issue.
Some of the orders revive priorities from his first administration that his predecessor had rolled back, including forcing asylum-seekers to wait in Mexico and finishing the border wall. Others created sweeping new strategies, like an effort to end automatic citizenship for anyone born in America, pulling the military into border security and ending use of a Biden-era app used by nearly a million migrants to enter America.
Actual execution of such a far-reaching immigration agenda is certain to face legal and logistical challenges. And few details have been released so far.
Here's are other executive orders and actions taken so far:
- Temporary suspension of all U.S. foreign assistance programs for 90 days pending reviews to determine whether they are aligned with his policy goals
- Creation of the "Department of Government Efficiency" or DOGE
- Overhauling the refugee admission program to better align with American principles and interests
- Declaring a “national emergency” at the U.S.-Mexico border
- Directive ending "the weaponization of political adversaries of the previous administration"
- Designating drug cartels as foreign terrorist organizations
- Directive ordering the restoration of freedom of speech and preventing government censorship of speech
- Withdrawal from the Paris climate agreement
- Directive to federal agencies to address the cost of living crisis
- Requirement that federal workers return to full-time in-person work
- Federal hiring freezes - except in military and other excluded categories
- Regulatory freeze "preventing bureaucrats from issuing any more regulations" until Trump has full control of the government
- Rescission of 78 Biden-era executive executive actions, executive orders, presidential memoranda and others
- Order halting offshore wind lease sales and pausing the issuance of approvals, permits and loans for both onshore and offshore wind projects
The scope and number of orders Trump was expected to sign far exceeds what he did on his first day in office in 2017, when he signed one executive order that targeted the Affordable Care Act.
It also goes beyond the number signed by Joe Biden on his first day in office. Biden signed nine executive orders on topics ranging from ethics commitments for executive branch personnel to combating discrimination based on gender identity and sexual orientation, while also signing orders reversing Trump directives on immigration and deregulation.
Biden also signed off on seven other executive actions that day in 2021, including directives aimed at halting funding of Trump’s border wall and reversing his decision to pull the U.S. out of the Paris climate agreement.