What executive orders did Donald Trump sign on Day 1 in office?

Reports said the 47th President of the United States signed around 200 executive orders, ranging from new immigration rules to withdrawal from the Paris Climate Accord to granting pardon to the rioters involved in the January 6, 2021 attack on the US Capitol.

Most of the orders, promises made in the run up to the polls, are in line with Trump ‘America first’ vision and are likely to be challenged in the court, say experts.

Here are the key ones:

Exit from WHO

Trump signed an executive order to kick off the process of withdrawing America from the World Health Organisation (WHO).

Trump in 2020 had heavily criticised the global health body for its response to the COVID-19 pandemic, which grew into a worldwide health crisis during the final year of his first term.

“That’s a big one,” Trump told reporters in the Oval Office of the White House when an aid presented to him the executive order on this to be signed by him.

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Trump had pulled out of WHO during his first term.

“We paid USD 500 million to World Health when I was here, and I terminated it. China, with 1.4 billion people, has 350 dependents... nobody knows what we have because so many people came in illegally. But let's say we have 325 (million people). They (China) had 1.4 billion people. They were paying USD39 million. We were paying USD500 million. It seemed a little unfair to me,” he said.

“That wasn't the reason, but I dropped out (of WHO). They offered me to come back for USD39 million. In theory, it should be less than that, but, when Biden came back, they came back for USD500 million. He knew that you could have come back for USD39 million. They wanted us back so badly. So, we'll see what happens,” he said.

The order said Trump was sending a presidential letter to the United Nations secretary-general to formally notify him of the US plan to withdraw.

This is Trump’s second attempt to withdraw the US from the WHO.

In July 2020, he sent a letter to WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus notifying him of the US intention to withdraw within a year. Trump accused the WHO at the time of helping China mislead the world about the spread of Covid-19.

But Trump was defeated in that year’s election, and when President Joe Biden took office in January 2021, he reversed Trump’s decision.

Ending birthright citizenship

Trump signed an order to end the policy which gives birthright citizenship to children born in the US to immigrant parents who lack legal status.

The order will also be applicable to children born to immigrant who are in the US on temporary work, student and tourist visas.

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It is, however, debatable whether the Trump administration would be able to implement it in the face of inevitable legal challenges as birthright citizenship is clearly enshrined in the US Constitution.

Declaring national emergency on southern border

As declared during his inaugural speech, Trump signed an order to impose a national emergency on the US-Mexico border under executive actions related to immigration.

He plans to send US troops to help support immigration agents and restrict influx refugees and even those who are seeking asylum.

Halting refugee resettlement in the US for at least four months, Trump instructed the military to prioritise on sealing the borders and stop unlawful mass migration and drug trafficking across borders.

The President also ordered defence and homeland security secretaries to take necessary action to “deploy and construct temporary and permanent physical barriers” on the southern border.

Exit from Paris climate agreement

The President also signed an executive order withdrawing the US, the world's largest historical emitter of greenhouse gases, from the Paris Agreement for the second time in a decade.

This places the US alongside Iran, Libya, and Yemen as the only countries not part of the 2015 global climate accord, which aims to limit global warming since the industrial revolution to 1.5 degrees Celsius.

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Trump has already signed a letter to the UN to intimate it about the decision.

At the UN climate conference in Azerbaijan, the US stepping back under Trump was one of the major factors behind a weak climate finance deal.

Trump initially announced the US withdrawal from the Paris Agreement in 2017 during his first term, a move reversed by the Joe Biden administration in early 2021.

In the run-up to the 2024 US elections, Trump had repeatedly referred to climate change as a "hoax" and reiterated his intention to pull the US out of the Paris Agreement. He called the Paris climate accord a one-sided agreement, stating that the US would not "sabotage its own industries while China pollutes with impunity".

Climate experts, however, say that the US decision will weaken global efforts to mitigate climate change, and the worst consequences will be felt in developing countries that have contributed the least to global emissions.

End to “weaponisation” of federal government

Trump also inked orders to stop what he called the “weaponisation” of the Department of Justice.

The order instructs the US attorney general and the director of national intelligence to review potential misconduct within the Justice Department, the Securities and Exchange Commission, the Federal Trade Commission and the intelligence community that may have happened in the last four years.

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His nominee for attorney-general, Pam Bondi, is widely expected to be an effective footsoldier in Trump’s war on institutions, enacting revenge on her boss’s behalf.

Pardons to Capitol rioters

Trump also used his clemency powers as president to commute the prison sentences of all of the 1,500-plus people charged with crimes in the January 6, 2021, US Capitol riot including people convicted of assaulting police officers.

Trump's action, just hours after his return to the White House, paves the way for the release from prison of people found guilty of violent attacks on police, as well as leaders of far-right extremist groups convicted of failed plots to keep the Republican in power after he lost the 2020 election to former President Joe Biden.

The pardons are a culmination of Trump's years-long campaign to rewrite the history of the January 6 attack that left more than 100 police officers injured as the angry mob of Trump supporters — some armed with poles, bats and bear spray — overwhelmed law enforcement, shattered windows and sent lawmakers and aides running into hiding.

Trump also ordered the attorney general to seek the dismissal of roughly 450 cases that are still pending before judges stemming from the largest investigation in Justice Department history.

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Casting the rioters as “patriots” and “hostages,” Trump has claimed they were unfairly treated by the Justice Department that also charged him with federal crimes in two cases he contends were politically motivated. Trump said the pardons will end “a grave national injustice that has been perpetrated upon the American people over the last four years" and begin "a process of national reconciliation.”

Delaying ban on TikTok

Trump also signed an order intended to pause Congress' TikTok ban for 75 days, a period in which the president says he will seek a US buyer in a deal that can protect national security interests while leaving the popular social media platform open to Americans.

The decision is said to have annoyed many including Senate Republicans who do not see a legal basis to extend the divestiture window. The order is likely to reach court as the president does not have the power to unilaterally overturn a law that has been passed by the Congress and proven in court.

Designating drug cartels as terrorist organisations

Trump signed an executive order designating drug cartels as foreign terrorist organisations in a move that could push a militarised agenda for the border and Latin America.

The order highlighted Mexican drug cartels and other Latin American criminal groups like Venezuela gang Tren de Aragua and Salvadoran gang Mara Salvatrucha (MS-13), which it said “threaten the safety of the American people, the security of the United States, and the stability of the international order in the Western Hemisphere.” The order did not list the groups by name, but said Cabinet secretaries would recommend groups for designation as terrorist organisations in the next 14 days.

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“The Cartels have engaged in a campaign of violence and terror throughout the Western Hemisphere that has not only destabilized countries with significant importance for our national interests but also flooded the United States with deadly drugs, violent criminals, and vicious gangs,” the order read.

Other orders

• The US President also temporarily suspended the US Refugee Admission Programme, pending a review to assess the programme's “public safety and national security” implications. He's also pledged to restart a policy that forced asylum seekers to wait over the border in Mexico, but officials didn't say whether Mexico would accept migrants again.
• Trump said he will end CBP One app, a Biden-era border app that gave legal entry to nearly 1 million migrants.
• On national security, the president revoked any active security clearances from a long list of his perceived enemies, including former director of national intelligence James Clapper, Leon Panetta, a former director of the CIA and defense secretary, and his own former national security adviser, John Bolton.
• Additionally, Trump declared an energy emergency as he promised to “drill, baby, drill,” and said he will eliminate what he calls Biden's electric vehicle mandate.
• Overhauling federal bureaucracy Trump has halted federal government hiring, excepting the military and other parts of government that went unnamed. He added a freeze on new federal regulations while he builds out his second administration.
• He formally empowered the so-called Department of Government Efficiency, which is being led by Elon Musk, the world's richest man. Ostensibly an effort to streamline government, DOGE is not an official agency.
• Trump will also withdraw protections for transgender people and terminate diversity, equity and inclusion programmes within the federal government. Both are major shifts for the federal policy and are in line with Trump's campaign trail promises. One order declares that the federal government would recognise only two immutable sexes: male and female. And they're to be defined based on whether people are born with eggs or sperm, rather than on their chromosomes, according to details of the upcoming order.