Hours after taking the oath of office, President Donald Trump signed a slate of executive orders in front of a cheering crowd at a watch party for his inauguration and modified parade at Capital One Arena in Washington on Monday.
He also said he was returning to the Oval Office on Monday evening to sign additional executive orders as well as pardons "for a lot of people" charged or convicted with crimes related to the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the U.S. Capitol.
After addressing his supporters and running down a list of executive actions he was set to take on his first day back in office, Trump signed nearly nine documents, holding them up to the roaring crowd each time, and at one point, stopping to ask those in the arena if they could imagine former President Joe Biden doing this.
The first document he signed was designed to undo nearly 80 of Biden’s own executive orders put in place during his four years in the White House. During his remarks before the signing ceremony, Trump referred to the order as “ destructive and radical,” touting that they would all be “null and void” within minutes.
The next focused on what Trump called a regulation freeze, describing it as a way to “stop Biden bureaucrats from continuing to regulate.”
“Most of those bureaucrats are being fired,” Trump, who pledged on the campaign trail to cut back on the size of the federal government, added. “They're gone.”
Among other actions taken was implementing a temporary hiring freeze in a bid, Trump said, to ensure that only competent people are being hired as well as an order mandating federal workers return to work in-person full-time.
Meanwhile, the president also pulled the U.S. out of the Paris Climate Agreement for the second time. He also withdrew the country from the pact during his first term before Biden rejoined.
The last set of orders included one that, as the president described, seeks to prevent government censorship as well as another aimed at cracking down on what Trump and his allies have referred to as the weaponization of the federal government.