President Donald Trump braved the cold weather to come to Washington last week pushed your opening indoorsBut the winds of winter were no match for the barrage of executive orders, pardons, and pens he wielded. Mr Trump dismantled the Biden administration's policies with each blow.
To many in Washington, it feels as if history is unfolding before us. “Absolutely,” said presidential historian Lindsay Chervinsky, executive director of the George Washington Presidential Library in Mount Vernon, Washington. “The thing that's really interesting about studying history is that when people are living historical moments, they Know it.
“There is no doubt that seeing came back after losing a presidential electionThis happened only once more, and then it came back Being convicted on dozens of felony chargesand was Joined the rebellion to overthrow the previous electionThese are not things we've seen before,” Chervinsky said. “And so, there's no doubt that we are living in a historic moment.”
On his first day in office, Mr Trump About 1,500 defendants were pardoned on 6 January.And Broke the record for signing executive ordersMore were released in the days that followed.
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They range from Renaming of Gulf of Mexico … To Ending diversity efforts in the federal workforce … To Withdrawal from Paris Climate Agreement and this World Health Organization … And Reinstating anti-abortion policies From his first term. he even tried Maintain the constitutional right of citizenship for all children born on American soilBut a federal judge has already hold that change,
Chervinsky said, “We are in a system that has a separation of powers. There have to be checks and balances. And it's important that both Congress and the courts do their part to check the president, just as the president checks them. That's how the system was designed to work, and I think that should give Americans comfort that sometimes they actually want to play that role.”
Executive orders have often been decisive and controversial. think about lincoln emancipation Proclamationor fdr financing the manhattan projectand his Internment of Japanese Americans in 1942remember eisenhower Deploying troops to desegregate southern schoolsand kennedy's creation of peace corps,
Over the past decade, Obama, Trump, and Biden have gone back and forth, reversing each other's policies.
Chervinsky said, “When a president needs to use executive orders to carry out most of his agenda, it means that either the agenda is not particularly popular, or it is one of the evils in our current political system.” Congress doesn't do that much. They're kind of a broken institution. So, we see a president trying to do that. Say no, they continue Will keep being done.
“There have definitely always been periods of fighting,” Chervinsky said. “American politics is messed up.”
“You even called it ‘vicious’,” I said.
“That would be an accurate description!” Chervinsky laughed.
It's all reminiscent of Benjamin Franklin's answer when he was asked whether America was a monarchy or a republic. Franklin said, “A republic, if you can keep it.”
I said, “We've been through all this in the past, and here we are today, carrying it forward.”
“As yet!” Chervinsky laughed. “One thing that's great about history is that it reminds us that we can be in really bad times but come out of them. What I think about in our present moment is probably different That we have forgotten that nothing is perfect and nothing is permanent.
“The Founding Generation, they were in the game because they fought in the war, or they were in Congress when this government was established. And so, no matter how terrible it was, they were never going to completely overthrow it.” Didn't want to throw it away because they tried to make it from scratch.
“I think a lot of Americans today take it for granted that we're always going to be here,” Chervinsky said.
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The story is produced by Ed Forgotson. Editor: Ed Givnish.
