Supporters of Donald Trump who attacked the US Capitol four years ago will start leaving prison on Tuesday, pardoned by the new president in a flurry of Inauguration Day executive orders showing intent to stamp radical change on the country.
Mr Trump was expected to sign more executive orders on Tuesday, after measures issued on Monday that included moves to curb immigration and roll back environmental regulation as well as a 75-day delay in enforcement of a ban on short-video app TikTok.
The Republican president’s pardon of 1,500 defendants drew outrage from lawmakers who were endangered in the January 6th, 2021, attack, when thousands of Mr Trump’s supporters stormed the Capitol in an unsuccessful attempt to prevent Congress certifying his 2020 election loss to Joe Biden.
The pardons were among orders Mr Trump signed within hours of taking office, returning in a mood of triumph to the White House after winning last November’s election. In his inaugural speech he criticised Mr Biden’s presidency and portrayed himself as chosen by God to save a faltering nation.
Keir Starmer holds fast as he insists ‘law forbade’ him from saying more about the Southport stabbings
Donald Trump returns to strike sombre tone of vindication and providential intercession
Right-wing figures jockey to be UK’s Trump whisperer as Keir Starmer is left to watch from afar
Trump inauguration speech signals regime change rather than a transfer of power
However, he faces a stiff challenge delivering on his promise of a “Golden Age of America” in the face of a closely split Congress, inevitable lawsuits and recalcitrant world leaders.
[ Keith Duggan: Trump's first hoursOpens in new window ]
Mr Trump did not take immediate action to raise tariffs, a key campaign promise, but said he could impose 25 per cent duties on Canada and Mexico on February 1st.
Mr Trump’s return to the White House has been met with both relief and disappointment across world markets as investors try to work out what the next four years will bring.
Mr Trump (78), is the first president in more than a century to win a second term after losing the White House and the first felon to occupy the White House. The oldest president ever to be sworn in, he is backed by Republican majorities in both chambers of Congress.
Mr Trump has made illegal immigration a signature issue since he first entered politics in 2015 and he began a sweeping crackdown on Monday.
Shortly after the inauguration, US border authorities said they had shut down Mr Biden’s CBP One entry programme, which had allowed hundreds of thousands of migrants to enter the US legally by scheduling an appointment on an app. Existing appointments were cancelled, leaving migrants stunned and unsure of what to do.
Opponents of Mr Trump’s agenda are likely to challenge it in the courts and the American Civil Liberties Union fired an opening salvo on Monday, saying in a federal court filing that Mr Trump’s decision to end the CBP One programme removed the only avenue to asylum at the US-Mexico border.
TMr rump once again withdrew the United States from the Paris climate deal, removing the world’s biggest historic emitter from global efforts to fight climate change for the second time in a decade. This second withdrawal will have a bigger impact in the US and globally than the country’s first retreat in 2017, analysts and diplomats said.
In other environmental measures, Mr Trump revoked a ban imposed by Biden on new offshore oil and gas development along most of the country’s coastlines. The new president is certain to face legal challenges over his authority to do so.
He also said the US would leave the World Health Organisation, saying the global health agency had mishandled the Covid-19 pandemic and other international health crises. Berlin would try to talk Mr Trump out of this decision, Germany’s health minister said on Tuesday.
Other orders revoked Biden administration policies governing artificial intelligence and electric vehicles.
He also imposed a freeze on federal hiring and ordered government workers to return to the office, rather than working from home. He also signed paperwork to create a “department of government efficiency”, an outside advisory board headed by billionaire Elon Musk that aims to cut large swaths of government spending.
Mr Trump said he would issue orders to scrap federal diversity programmes and require the government to recognise only genders assigned at birth.
Mr Trump said he would change the name of the Gulf of Mexico to the Gulf of America and repeated his intention to take back control of the Panama Canal, one of several foreign policy pronouncements that have caused consternation among US allies. - Reuters
- Sign up for push alerts and have the best news, analysis and comment delivered directly to your phone
- Join The Irish Times on WhatsApp and stay up to date
- Listen to our Inside Politics podcast for the best political chat and analysis