Today, hours after taking the oath of office, President Joe Biden will take a historic number of actions to deliver immediate relief for families across America that are struggling in the face of converging crises and to reverse course from the Trump administration.
Biden will sign a combination of executive orders, memoranda, directives, and letters to take initial steps to address these crises, including by changing the course of the COVID-19 pandemic, providing economic relief, tackling climate change, and advancing racial equity. President Biden will take action — not just to reverse what they call “the gravest damages of the Trump administration” — but also to start moving our country forward. These actions begin the work of following through on Biden’s promises to the American people on the campaign trail, and, importantly noted by the new administration, fall within the constitutional role for the president.
A summary of 17 actions Biden will take include:
1. Stop border wall construction
2. End the “Muslim travel ban”
3. Rejoin the Paris Climate Agreement (this will take 30 days to go into effect)
4. End the Keystone XL pipeline and revoke oil and gas development at national wildlife monuments (at the Bears Ears and Grand Staircase-Escalante national monuments in Utah and at the Northeast Canyons and Seamounts Marine national monuments in New England)
5. Count non-citizens in U.S. Census again
6. Rejoin the World Health Organization (Dr. Anthony Fauci will join a board meeting to deliver remarks on global health and the COVID-19 pandemic)
7. “100 Days Masking Challenge” (a nationwide face mask and social distance mandate on federal buildings, lands and by federal employees and contractors)
8. Extend eviction and foreclosure moratoriums
9. Continue “pause” on student loan payments until September 30th
10. Defend “Dreamers” program for undocumented young Americans
11. Change Trump’s arrest priorities for Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE)
12. Keep protections for a group of Liberians in the country
13. Restructure federal government coordination to the COVID-19 pandemic
14. Actions to advance racial equity through the federal government (Every federal agency to review equity in their programs and actions. Revoke Trump’s “harmful” 1776 Commission)
15. Strengthen workplace discrimination protections based on sexual orientation and gender identity
16. Freezing last-minute Trump administration regulatory actions
17. Formulate Executive Branch ethics doctrine (President Biden wants every executive branch appointee to sign an ethics pledge – “And the pledge commits federal employees to uphold the independence of the Department of Justice”)
