Published 14:16 IST, January 21st 2021
Joe Biden signs 15 executive orders on the first day as US President
Just after finishing the historic oath-taking ceremony and being inaugurated as the 46th US President, Joe Biden signed 15 executive orders, two directives.
Just after finishing the oath-taking ceremony and being inaugurated as the 46th US President, Joe Biden signed 15 executive orders, two directives in the immediate attempt to rewind the last four years of federal policies introduced by Donald Trump. As per reports, apart from Biden, only two US Presidents have signed executive actions on their very first day in the White House. However, the 46th US President showcased a sense of urgency on Day 1 as he had mentioned during the campaign rallies to revamp the government policies, plunging economy and a riven electorate.
“There’s no time to start like today,” Biden said in his first comments to reporters as president.
Biden’s first executive actions
From rejoining the Paris Climate Agreement of 2015 to revoking the ‘Muslim travel ban’, Joe Biden’s blitz of executive actions went beyond the COVID-19 pandemic. He also rechecked the environmental record of the previous administration and retained the US as a member of the World Health Organization (WHO). Biden also called for a review of all the regulations and executive orders that are reportedly deemed damaging to the climate as well as public health, his aides had said.
Biden’s first executive order was launching his 100-day masking challenge that urged all US citizens to wear facemasks for 100 days. Even though it was previously announced, Joe Biden officially appointed a COVID-19 response coordinator in a bid to have a unified approach to the health crisis in the country. Further, he also re-established the national security team that was responsible for the global health, security and bio-defence of the United States.
In the second executive order after the mask challenge, Biden has retracted the harmful regulatory reversals made by the previous administration to safeguard the health of the public as well as the condition of the environment. Moreover, in order to modify Trump’s stringent immigration rules, Biden not only halted the construction of the US-Mexico border wall but also sent an immigration bill (the US Citizenship Act of 2021) to Congress to modernise the immigration system. In his first day in the office, Biden has made his intentions clear.
Updated 14:16 IST, January 21st 2021