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On the first day in office, President Joe Biden made a swift move towards dismantling Donald Trump’s legacy. He signed a series of executive actions that reverse course on immigration, climate change, racial equity, and the handling of the coronavirus pandemic. He signed a series of executive actions that reversed course on immigration, climate change, racial equity, and the handling of the coronavirus pandemic.
After taking the oath at the Capitol, the new President signed these orders. Biden pivoting quickly from his pared-down inauguration ceremony to enacting his agenda. He passed an order to halt the construction of Mr. Trump’s U.S.-Mexico border wall. He also ended the ban on travel from some Muslim-majority countries. He declared his intention to rejoin the Paris Climate Accord and the World Health organization and revoked the approval of the Keystone XL oil pipelines, as aides said.
Well, the 15 executive actions will be attempted for rewinding the last four years of federal policies with striking speed. On the first day in office, only two presidents recently signed the executive actions and each signed only once. Mr. Biden facing the debilitating coronavirus pandemic that damages the economy and a riven electorate. He is now intent on demonstrating a sense of urgency and competence which urged has been missing under his Republican predecessor.
To the reporters, Mr. Biden made his first comment “There’s no time to start like today.’
In the Oval Office, Mr. Biden wore a mask as he signed- a marked departure of Mr. Trump who rarely wore a mask in public or during the events in Oval Office. Now, mask-wearing is made important in the building. Among the top executive actions mask is made mandatory in the federal property. Mr. Biden has also extended the federal eviction freeze to help those who are struggling from the pandemic economic fallouts. He has created a new federal office to coordinate a national response to the virus and restored the White House’s National Security Council directorate for global health security and defense.
In inaugural, Mr. Biden paused which he called as his first act as President- a moment of silent prayers for those victims of the nation’s worst public health crisis. He declared that in the coming weeks he will “press forward with speed and urgency.’ He said in his speech, “For we have much to do in this winter of peril and significant possibilities — much to repair, much to restore, much to heal, much to build and much to gain.”
However, Mr. Biden’s blitz of executive actions went beyond the pandemic. He has targeted Mr. Trump’s environmental record and called for a review of all regulations and executive actions which deemed damage to the environment or public health. Moreover, another order instructs the federal agencies to prioritize racial equity and review policies that reinforce systemic racism.
Mr. Biden also revoked a Trump order which sought to exclude non-citizen from the census and ordered federal employees to take an ethics pledge which commits them to uphold the independence of the Justice Department.
Aides also said that he also revoked the just-issued report of Mr. Trump’s “1776 Commission” which promotes “patriotic education.”
President’s aides said that those moves and others will be followed by dozens more in the next 10days. Mr. Biden is redirecting the country without having to go through a Senate that Democrats control by the narrowest margin and will soon turn to Mr. Trump’s impeachment trial.
Republicans signaled that Mr. Biden will face fierce options on several parts of his agenda. One of his orders seeks to fortify the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals, known as DACA, a signature effort of the Obama administration that provided hundreds of thousands of young immigrants protection from deportation and a pathway to citizenship. That’s part of a broader immigration plan that would provide an eight-year path to citizenship for an estimated 11 million people living in the U.S. without legal status. The plan would lead to “a permanent cycle of illegal immigration and amnesty that would hurt hard-working Americans and the millions of legal immigrants working their way through the legal immigration process,” said Chris Hartline, a spokesperson for the National Republican Senatorial Committee.
Even that familiar criticism seemed a return to the normalcy Mr. Biden has promised after years of disruptive and overheated politics. Mr. Biden’s first day in the White House was a celebration of Washington traditions. He attended church with both Democratic and Republican leaders of Congress.
In another effort to signal a return to pre-Trump times, Jen Psaki, the new White House press secretary, said she would hold a news briefing late on Wednesday in a symbol of the administration’s commitment to transparency. Mr. Trump’s White House had all but abandoned the practice of briefing reporters daily.
Notably, Mr. Biden’s action doesn’t include immediate steps to rejoin the Iran nuclear accord that Mr. Trump abandoned and Mr. Biden has pledged to implement. Ms. Paki also noted that more actions are coming that includes plans to revoke Pentagon’s ban on military service by transgender Americans as well as the so-called Mexico City policy. This bans U.S. funding for international organizations that perform or refers women for abortion services.
