The Trump Era As Of Day Two

Zerohedge has a rundown on the major Executive Orders (EO)s) that Trump has signed—so far. There are many more to come. Many repeal Zhou initiatives, as expected. For the full rundown follow the link—I’ll only be providing snapshots, so if you have a particular interest check it out. However, the full implications of some may not be immediately apparent for some time to come:

An Overview Of Trump's Day One Executive Actions

Before I start, I want to draw attention to MoA’s account of the EOs. It’s not nearly as comprehensive as the ZH account, but it illustrates a development that has flowed from the past four years—the realization among conservatives as well as Lefties that there is some degree of common ground. So, for example, while Bernard at MoA deplores the withdrawal from the Paris Climate stuff and from the WHO, I regard the WHO related EO as extremely important (see ZH below). On the other hand, Bernard—a Lefty speaking to an audience he assumes is also Lefty—is excited about other extremely important EOs that will also excite conservatives:

Trump Abolishes Democrats' DEI And Trans-Craze Policies

I do dislike many of the EOs Trump issued. Leaving the World Health Organization and the Paris Agreements, and thereby de-legitimizing them, is not good for mankind. Further supporting the Zionst entity is a disgrace.

Others I do like. Trump pardoned participants of the Jan 6 (2021) 'riots' which had never amounted to much more than a hustle.

He rescinded many of EOs the Biden administration had issued around its diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) policies. Attempts of social engineering against merit deserve to fail.

I am also very happy that Trump has ended the official Trans craze. The wording herein is remarkable:

DEFENDING WOMEN FROM GENDER IDEOLOGY EXTREMISM AND RESTORING BIOLOGICAL TRUTH TO THE FEDERAL GOVERNMENT

Across the country, ideologues who deny the biological reality of sex have increasingly used legal and other socially coercive means to permit men to self-identify as women and gain access to intimate single-sex spaces and activities designed for women, from women’s domestic abuse shelters to women’s workplace showers. This is wrong. Efforts to eradicate the biological reality of sex fundamentally attack women by depriving them of their dignity, safety, and well-being.
...
This unhealthy road is paved by an ongoing and purposeful attack against the ordinary and longstanding use and understanding of biological and scientific terms, replacing the immutable biological reality of sex with an internal, fluid, and subjective sense of self unmoored from biological facts. Invalidating the true and biological category of “woman” improperly transforms laws and policies designed to protect sex-based opportunities into laws and policies that undermine them, replacing longstanding, cherished legal rights and values with an identity-based, inchoate social concept.

There are and will be many more Trump policies which (will) deserve to be condemned and criticized.

That should not hinder us to admit that he got some things right.

Moving on the ZH rundown—for readability I’ve edited without including the normal ellipses. Just assume that what you’re seeing are snapshots:

Border and Immigration

Trump issued 10 executive actions on border security, including a national emergency declaration to pave the way for military deployment to the border and the completion of a border wall.

Trump’s executive orders set the stage for deportation operations while cracking down on illegal immigration and crime.

Trump’s orders reinstate Remain in Mexico, end catch-and-release of illegal immigrants, designate cartels as foreign terrorist organizations, pause refugee resettlement, end birthright citizenship, and bring back the death penalty for certain crimes against federal agents.

Reducing Inflation

In his executive action, Trump referenced the “unprecedented regulatory oppression” from the previous administration that he estimates “have imposed almost $50,000 in costs on the average American household.”

He ordered heads of all executive departments and agencies to provide “emergency price relief.” The measures will include expanding the housing supply, eliminating administrative expenses and rent-seeking practices that add to health care costs, and removing requirements that raise the costs of home appliances.

Trump, according to the memorandum, will abolish “harmful, coercive ‘climate’ policies that increase the costs of food and fuel.”

Trade and Tariffs

A portion of Trump’s raft of executive orders focused on his trade agenda.

The 47th president presented a broad trade memorandum that directs federal agencies, including the Treasury, Commerce, and Homeland Security, to examine unfair trade relationships and currency policies with other countries, particularly Canada, Mexico, and China.

WHO Withdrawal

Trump also signed an executive order to remove the United States from the World Health Organization (WHO), a United Nations agency.

The order also ends any negotiations on the organization’s global pandemic treaty.

Climate Pact Exit

Trump has again withdrawn the United States from the 2015 Paris Climate Agreement, essentially reissuing his 2017 executive order leaving the global accord.

It will take a year to formally disenroll from the pact but it signals the nation’s energy policy will no longer adhere to global carbon emission goals.

Withdrawing from the climate pact will save taxpayers $1 trillion, the White House said.

National Energy Emergency

Trump declared a national energy emergency, and opened millions of acres in Alaska to fossil fuel development in the first of many energy-related executive actions expected.

Alaskan oil is considered “medium”, so it can’t replace imports of important “heavy” oil, such as from Canada and Russia.

Inflation Reduction Act

Three other orders reverse energy-related Biden orders that provided regulatory authority for implementing many aspects of the 2022 Inflation Reduction Act (IRA).

Trump and Republican congressional leaders vow to dismember … the signature bills of Biden’s “New Green Deal.”

The IRA alone authorizes 10 years of sustained tax credits, low-interest loans, and grant programs that by some estimates could top $1 trillion.

By repealing Biden’s three executive orders, the White House and Congress can administratively tighten tax credits, claw back some loans and grants, and revise unfinalized rules under the Congressional Review Act to chip away at the IRA.

End of EV Agenda

In line with his vision for U.S. energy, Trump rescinded an executive order signed by Biden in August 2021 that set a target of 50 percent zero-emission new vehicle sales by the end of the decade. Electric vehicle sales in the United States reached 8.1 percent of sales in 2024, according to Cox Automotive.

The 47th president also overturned a December 2021 executive order requiring that, by 2035, all vehicles the government procures are emission-free. Light-body vehicles would have had to meet that mark by 2027.

Another new executive order establishes as U.S. policy an intention to eliminate electric vehicle subsidies and to eliminate state fuel emissions waivers. California introduced its Clean Air Act waiver as a regulatory driver of electric vehicle adoption.

Federal Bureaucracy, DOGE

Trump also promised to reform and streamline government bureaucracy so that it will “work for the American people,” including by freezing “bureaucrat hiring except in essential areas.”

He announced the rescission of a slate of executive orders with the goal to improve government workers’ accountability. Another EO requires that all federal workers return to in-person work, noting that “only 6 percent of employees currently work in person.”

No Government Censorship

Trump issued an executive order against government censorship, which he vowed would “bring back free speech to America.”

“Never again will the immense power of the state be weaponized to persecute political opponents, something I know something about,” Trump said in his inaugural address.

The executive order establishes as policy that federal employees cannot restrain American citizens’ free speech or use money from taxpayers to that end.

It also directs the attorney general to prepare a report to address abuses against Americans’ free speech under the Biden administration.

Trump added that he would swiftly purge the federal government of those who facilitated domestic censorship and keep federal funds from going to initiatives that would empower certain groups to determine what is “mis-” or “disinformation.”

“Under the guise of combating ’misinformation,‘ ’disinformation,‘ and ’malinformation,’ the Federal Government infringed on the constitutionally protected speech rights of American citizens across the United States in a manner that advanced the Government’s preferred narrative about significant matters of public debate,” the order states.

This should keep Pam Bondi very busy. Also Kash Patel.

Exposing Abuse

Trump also moved to prevent the destruction of records as his administration takes the helm, part of a broader executive order aimed at addressing what he has characterized as a partisan takeover of government institutions that should remain neutral.

“To stop the weaponization of law enforcement and our government, I will also sign an order directing every federal agency to preserve all records pertaining to political persecutions under the last administration, of which there were many, and beginning the process of exposing any and all abuses of power, even though he’s pardoned many of these people,” Trump said shortly before signing that and other executive orders, and referring to Biden’s preemptive pardons.

Also one for Bondi and Patel.

Security Clearances Stripped

Trump’s executive actions also include an order targeting election interference. It cites the 2020 letter signed by 51 former intelligence officials who dismissed accounts of Hunter Biden’s laptop as “part of a Russian disinformation campaign.”

The order revokes the security clearances of Bolton as well as 49 intelligence officials involved in the 2020 Hunter Biden laptop analysis, including former director of national intelligence James Clapper, former Central Intelligence Agency Director John Brennan, and former Defense Secretary Leon Panetta.

It also instructs the director of national intelligence to produce a report on steps to take to prevent election interference in the future.

Pardons for Jan. 6

The new president also followed through on a promise to pardon participants in the U.S. Capitol breach on Jan. 6, 2021.

TikTok Reprieve

Trump signed an executive order to give social media platform TikTok 75 days to secure a U.S. buyer. Without separating from its Beijing-based parent company, ByteDance, TikTok faces a ban in the United States.

Next two are hugely important for restoring a measure of sanity to public life and protecting freedom of expression:

DEI Targeted

Diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) policies were the focus of another executive order.

“This week, I will also end the government policy of trying to socially engineer race and gender into every aspect of public and private light,” Trump said in his inauguration speech. “We will forge a society that is color-blind and merit-based.”

The new order ends all federal programs and preferences that are based on race, sex, gender, or any other immutable characteristics. It also instructs the Director of the Office of Management and Budget and the attorney general to terminate all “discriminatory programs, including illegal DEI and “diversity, equity, inclusion, and accessibility” (DEIA) mandates, policies, programs, preferences, and activities in the Federal Government, under whatever name they appear.”

A White House statement said Trump will “freeze bureaucrat hiring except in essential areas to end the onslaught of useless and overpaid DEI activists buried into the federal workforce.”

Two Sexes Policy

Trump also signed an order to create a new U.S. policy on gender.

“As of today, it will henceforth be the official policy of the United States government that there are only two genders—male and female,” Trump said in his inauguration speech.

Trump’s executive order defines a female as “a person belonging at conception to the sex that produces the large reproductive cell,” which refers to eggs or ovum.

The definition does not distinguish gender and sex based on chromosomes, bypassing the issue of those who may have an irregular combination of chromosomes.

The federal government will no longer “promote” gender ideology and will revoke the Biden administration’s efforts to expand Title IX to include gender identity.

The EO also protects women’s privacy in intimate spaces such as bathrooms and changing rooms, while also safeguarding against enforcing pronoun policies that encroach on free speech.

Trump will be issuing a “massive” infrastructure related order today.

In addition, another EO restructured the NSC. This could be hugely important for getting better control over the Deep State. CTH presents the entirety of the order, which CTH admits is highly technical. We’ll need to wait for expert analysis to understand the implications. However, Sundance maintains that this restructuring implements reforms he has been urging—we’ll have to see, but this is what he says:

The most effective way to confront a rogue, hostile and corrupt IC apparatus is to take away their power. ...

Turn each silo into an irrelevant echo-chamber by using the White House National Security Council as their replacement. Regardless of what triggers the various IC silo embeds try to pull (CIA, NSA, FBI, DIA, etc.) let them shoot blanks by removing their power over policy and process.

If the IC is isolated from influence, eventually the Legislative Branch, specifically the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence and the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence, will realize the ‘Seven Ways from Sunday’ group no longer hold power. The IC becomes a crew stomping their feet while no one pays attention.

This approach would be affected by restructuring the President’s National Security Council (NSC), the National Security Advisor (NSA Mike Waltz) and working with the Office of the Director of National Intelligence (DNI Tulsi Gabbard), in a synergistic process. The IC become simply information functionaries. The Nat Sec Council then validates and defines the information, creates the definitions of national security interest, and initiates the guidance to President Trump, who ultimately triggers any action.

Until yesterday there were only a few subtle signs that this ‘silo isolation’ approach was being accepted as the most effective optimal solution to the problem within the intelligence apparatus. However, yesterday President Trump signed an Executive Order [SEE HERE] doing exactly the type of restructuring that is needed.

Clearly the sum of the EOs—with many more to come—establishes Trump’s control over the government while the nomination process—which appears to be forging ahead—will put people he trusts/controls in charge of effectuating that control.