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Donald Trump has vowed to get to work quickly on his first day in office, seeking to sign up to 100 executive orders within just hours.
He declared the “golden age of America begins right now” and decreed that the nation’s challenges would be “annihilated” in his inaugural presidential address.
His exact plans for the executive orders he will sign on day one are yet to be revealed, but he has made it clear he is looking to expand US oil drilling, pardon some of the January 6 rioters, impose heavy tariffs on a number of countries and shut down migration at the southern US border.
Here is what we know so far.
What is an executive order?
An executive order is a directive by the president of the United States that manages operations of the federal government.
They allow a president to wield power without action from Congress, but there are limits to what orders can achieve.
Elon Musk on the phone during Trump’s moment of triumph
An incoming president signing a flurry of executive orders is standard practice.
During his first term, Trump signed 220 executive orders in total.
Biden signed 160 as of December 20.
What orders have already been signed?
Having just been sworn in, Trump is yet to sign any executive orders.
But he has already signed a proclamation order that on today and future inauguration days, the US flag at the White House flag will fly at full-staff, superseding any previous orders to lower flags.
Trump previously bemoaned that the US flag would fly at half-mast during his inauguration due to it being an official mourning period for former president Jimmy Carter.
What are Trump’s plans as president?
Trump has spoken on many issues he feels passionately about making quick changes for.
Trump will sign an order renaming the Gulf of Mexico, making it the Gulf of America. And the highest mountain in North America, now known as Mount Denali, will revert back to Mount McKinley, its name until president Barack Obama changed it. The renaming is to honor “American greatness,” according to a preview of the orders posted online by Trump’s incoming press secretary.
Much of the executive action on the border is ripped from Trump’s first-term playbook. He will declare a national emergency at the US-Mexico border, send US troops to help support immigration agents and restrict refugees and asylum. He’s also pledged to restart a policy that forced asylum seekers to wait over the border in Mexico.
Trump is set to sign orders to ease regulatory burdens on oil and natural gas production, including an order tied to Alaska.
Earlier this month, Trump said he would impose a 25 per cent tax on all products entering the US from Canada and Mexico, and an additional 10 per cent tariff on goods from China, as one of his first executive orders.
Trump mingles with billionaires at candlelight dinner on eve of inauguration
Diversity, equity and inclusion and transgender rights
Trump said he would roll back protections for transgender people and terminating diversity, equity and inclusion programs within the federal government.
Both are major shifts for the federal policy and are in line with Trump’s campaign trail promises.
One order would declare that the federal government would recognise only two immutable sexes: male and female.
Under the order, federal prisons and shelters for migrants and rape victims would be segregated by sex as defined by the order. And federal taxpayer money could not be used to fund “transition services.”
A separate order halts DEI programs, directing the White House to identify and end them within the government.
Pardons in the Jan. 6 US Capitol attack
Trump has promised to pardon those convicted in the January 6, 2021, attack on the US Capitol, but it was not mentioned in his inaugural speech.
Trump will declare an declare an energy emergency as he promises to “drill, baby, drill,” and says he will eliminate what he calls Biden’s electric vehicle mandate.
– with Associated Press
