I was intending to keep a little history here, recording President Trump’s actions on day one in office as the 47th President of the United States. I went to the White House site for the official record, although it may be the count is off, because some items do several things at once, such as appointing cabinet and other staff, and granting clemency to multiple individuals. (Order is newest to oldest, or start at the beginning here.)
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| President Donald J. Trump on Day 1, January 20, 2025 Image credit Doug Mills/New York Times |
I’ll note here that there is a specific purpose for an executive order: to carry out the law. It is not an extra-constitutional privilege of the president to make law by circumventing the legislative branch. Previous administrations’ practices notwithstanding, executive orders are to direct how his administration will carry out existing laws.
I read that there were, on day one, 26 executive orders, 12 memoranda, 4 proclamations, plus 75 Biden executive orders that were withdrawn (which aren’t included in the list). Another list had 40 items—plus the link to the official Presidential Actions website.
Today (January 24) there is one, I call it a proclamation, but the item itself doesn’t say what it is. It’s a sort of summary of the executive actions of the First 100 Hours. In it they (the White House) say:
Within the first 100 hours of his second administration, President Trump [has] taken hundreds of executive actions to secure the border, deport criminal illegal immigrants, unleash American prosperity, lower costs, increase government transparency, and reinstitute merit-based hiring in the federal government.
“Hundreds” is more than my list through the week. So they must be counting the multiple items within many of these. Or there are things he's doing, or announcing, that are not on the official list. This is to say, I don't really know how many there are. He's been very busy.
I thought I’d just list them items, and then comment on a few. And
that is what I’m about to do. But I ended up also listing the additional
executive orders, memoranda, and proclamations through Friday, January 24,
because important things keep happening. That may continue to be true, possibly
even on the weekend, and certainly next week. It’s leaving us breathless.
Here’s the list. And then we’ll talk.
January 20, 2025
1.
President Trump Announces Cabinet andCabinet-Level Appointments (staffing)
o Scott
Bessent, of South Carolina, to be Secretary of the Treasury.
o Pamela
Bondi, of Florida, to be Attorney General.
o Douglas
Burgum, of North Dakota, to be Secretary of the Interior.
o Lori
Chavez-DeRemer, of Oregon, to be Secretary of Labor.
o Douglas
Collins, of Georgia, to be Secretary of Veterans Affairs.
o Sean
Duffy, of Wisconsin, to be Secretary of Transportation.
o Peter
Hegseth, of Tennessee, to be Secretary of Defense.
o Robert
F. Kennedy, Jr., of California, to be Secretary of Health and Human Services.
o Howard
Lutnick, of New York, to be Secretary of Commerce.
2.
President Trump Announces Sub-Cabinet Appointments (staffing)
3.
President Trump Announces Acting Cabinet and Cabinet-Level Positions (staffing)
4.
President Trump Designates Chairmen and Acting Chairmen (staffing)
5.
Flying the Flag of the United States at Full-Staff on Inauguration Day Proclamation
6.
Initial Rescissions of Harmful Executive Orders and Actions Executive
Order
7.
Restoring Freedom of Speech and Ending Federal Censorship Executive
Order
8.
Ending the Weaponization of the Federal Government Executive
Order
9.
Return to In-Person Work Memorandum
10. Regulatory Freeze Pending Review Memorandum
11. Hiring Freeze Memorandum
12. Delivering Emergency Price Relief for American Families and Defeating the Cost-of-Living Crisis Memorandum
13. Putting America First in International Environmental Agreements Executive Order
14. Granting Pardons and Commutation of Sentences for Certain Offenses Relating to the Events at or Near the United States Capitol on January 6, 2021 Proclamation
15. Holding Former Government Officials Accountable for Election Interference and Improper Disclosure of Sensitive Governmental Information Executive Order
16. Declaring a National Emergency at the Southern Border of the United States Proclamation
17. Memorandum to Resolve the Backlog of Security Clearances for Executive Office of the President Personnel Memorandum
18. America First Trade Policy Memorandum
19. Clarifying the Military’s Role in Protecting the Territorial Integrity of the United States Executive Order
20. Unleashing American Energy Executive Order
21. Realigning the United States Refugee Admissions Program Executive Order
22. Protecting the Meaning and Value of American Citizenship Executive Order
23. Securing Our Borders Executive Order
24. Putting People over Fish: Stopping Radical Environmentalism to Provide Water to Southern California Memorandum
25. Restoring the Death Penalty and Protecting Public Safety Executive Order
26. Promoting Beautiful Federal Civic Architecture Memorandum
27. Restoring Accountability for Career Senior Executives Memorandum
28. Declaring a National Energy Emergency Executive Order
30. Reevaluating and Realigning United States Foreign Aid Executive Order
31. Organization of the National Security Council and Subcommittees Memorandum
32. The Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) Global Tax Deal(Global Tax Deal) Memorandum
33. Protecting the American People Against Invasion Executive Order
34. Unleashing Alaska’s Extraordinary Resource Potential Executive Order
35. Protecting the United States from Foreign Terrorists and Other National Security and Public Safety Threats Executive Order
36. America First Policy Directive to the Secretary of State Executive Order
37. Establishing and Implementing the President’s “Department of Government Efficiency” Executive Order
38. Defending Women from Gender Ideology Extremism and Restoring Biological Truth to the Federal Government Executive Order
39. Ending Radical and Wasteful Government DEI Programs and Preferencing Executive Order
40. Reforming the Federal Hiring Process and Restoring Merit to Government Service Executive Order
41. Designating Cartels and Other Organizations as Foreign Terrorist Organizations and Specially Designated Global Terrorists Executive Order
42. Restoring Names That Honor American Greatness Executive Order
43. Guaranteeing the States Protection Against Invasion Proclamation
January 21, 2025
44. Keeping Americans Safe in Aviation Executive Order
45. Ending Illegal Discrimination and Restoring Merit-Based Opportunity Executive Order
January 22, 2025
46. Nominations Transmitted to the Senate (staffing)
47. Executive Grant of Clemency for Andrew Zabavsky Proclamation
48. Designation of Ansar Allah as a Foreign Terrorist Organization Executive Order
49. Executive Grant of Clemency for Terence Sutton Proclamation
January 23, 2025
50. Federal Recognition of the Lumbee Tribe of North Carolina Memorandum
51. Strengthening American Leadership in Digital Financial Technology Executive Order
52. Declassification of Records Concerning the Assassinations of President John F. Kennedy, Senator Robert F. Kennedy, and the Reverend Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Executive Order
53. President’s Council of Advisors on Science and Technology Executive Order
54. Removing Barriers to American Leadership in Artificial Intelligence Executive Order
January 24, 2025
55. The First 100 Hours: Historic Action to Kick Off America’s Golden Age Proclamation
56. Enforcing the Hyde Amendment Executive Order
Whew!
Some of the most notable are the promises kept to secure
the southern border and to pardon and release the J6 political
prisoners. There was hesitation on a very few J6 cases, because of actual
violence, but they got their sentences commuted—that is, they were not
exonerated like the 1500 or so others, but their time served is all that is
required of their sentences, which were ridiculously harsh compared to criminals
convicted of even worse violence but not related to J6.
He took on some woke issues right away. Another first day
action was to declare that the federal government will only recognize two sexes:
male and female. And no more DEI; the federal government is now merit-based—getting
rid of illegal discrimination.
As exciting as Day 1 was, releasing all the classified
documents related to the assassinations of JFK, RFK, and MLK was
noteworthy. I’m looking forward to getting some verifiable truth related to
those—even if it reveals deep corruption within some three-letter agencies,
which is I think what most of us expect to see. This is part of draining the
swamp and clearing out the corruption; you have to see what slime you have to
shovel out, so you don’t cover over a rotting foundation.
The exciting news added today was in the last executive order plus the last memorandum of the day. Enforcing the Hyde Amendment means preventing federal taxpayer dollars from going toward abortions or abortion services or providers. This had been in effect since 1980 (after 300,000 abortions had already been paid for with federal funds).
The original Hyde Amendment allowed for funding only in
cases where abortion was necessary to save the life of the mother. In 1993, the
exceptions of abortions where the pregnancy had resulted from rape or incest
were added (note that incest implies coercion, or technically rape, even though
it wasn’t a one-time crime or was not repeatedly resisted by the victim). While
Democrats such as Hillary Clinton ran saying they would get rid of the Hyde
Amendment, no one had ever attempted it until Joe Biden in 2022. His first
attempt was to eliminate the Hyde Amendment from an omnibus spending bill, but
it was placed back in. So he did it by executive order. Trump’s executive order
includes revoking two Biden executive orders from 2022:
· Executive Order 14076 of July 8, 2022 - Protecting Access to Reproductive Healthcare Services
· Executive Order 14079 of August 3, 2022 - Securing Access to Reproductive and Other Healthcare Services [The link included in this week’s executive order did not have the right link for this, but I found it by the number.]
It looks to me, from a quick read through the Biden
executive orders, that he would simply not abide by the Hyde Amendment’s
requirement not to fund abortions, because he supported abortion as a “women’s
health care right.” This was in opposition to the Supreme Court ruling in the Dobbs
decision in June 2022. So, thank you, President Trump, for taking care of this
detail and removing our condemnation.
The memorandum that followed up was to prevent abortion funding to other nations, often through NGOs and non-profits and charities.
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| Vice President JD Vance, marching for life, image from DC_Draino on Instagram |
Another first day action was to declare an energy
emergency. That might be a bit of a hyperbole. During the Biden
administration, gas prices got pretty high, but they went down this past year,
I’m assuming in anticipation of the election. The real concern has been
preventing use of existing oil reserves, such as in Alaska, prioritizing some
climate change faux science over actual energy needs. And there was the
draining of the strategic oil reserves that Biden was pretty cavalier about.
Add to that an expected increase in energy use with electric vehicles and with
increased use of AI. So, maybe we weren’t exactly in a crisis, but we needed urgent
changes. And those of us living here in Houston, up the road from the energy
corridor of the energy capital, appreciate it.
Another big one was ending birthright citizenship. That
one deserves an entire post, maybe another day. Let’s just quote the 14th
Amendment, Section 1, in case you need a refresher:
All persons born or naturalized in the United States AND
SUBJECT TO THE JURISDICTION THEREOF, are citizens of the United States and
of the State wherein they reside.
I highlighted the part so many people fail to notice. This isn’t for persons who are accidentally born here when a mother with a visitor’s visa goes into labor during a vacation; such a child would still be a citizen of the mother’s and/or father’s country. In fact, people from our protectorates, such as American Samoa, who can freely visit here, are not entitled to citizenship merely by being born here. The purpose of the 14th Amendment was to cover those persons who had been born and living in the country but denied citizenship during slavery. This amendment was ratified in 1868, shortly after the Civil War. It was much later (about a century later) that someone got the idea of applying this to illegal aliens, creating “anchor babies.” This is a correction of that misinterpretation. (Robert Gouveia does a good discussion here.)
President Trump has said it will not affect those previously
born here (prior to January 20, 2025) under the prior administration’s
interpretation of the Amendment. So, all those people out there claiming he’s
throwing young people out, some of whom have never known another country—get a
grip. He’s just making sure the world no longer comes here thinking that, if
they can just have a baby here, who would get citizenship, then that might be
their ticket to being allowed to stay. President Trump is removing that illegal-alien
magnet. And, of course, it’s going to be litigated.
There’s plenty more to cover, but this will suffice for
now. And from here we just get to see how it plays out. My guess is that a very
high percentage of these executive orders will bring us back into balance, and
closer to the Constitution. And that will be a good thing.
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