When Donald Trump took office for the first time in 2017, there was a lot of uncertainty about how he would govern. He was an outsider in the Republican party, and it wasn’t clear if he would govern in the vein of traditional Republicans, be more socially moderate and economically conservative, or be something different. Some of the chaos of the first term was the see-sawing between different factions in the Trump Administration. That is not where we find ourselves today. As Trump takes office in 2025, Trump has been the dominant force in the Republican party for 8 years and has remade it in his image. He’s chased critics from the party, rewritten the policy fundamentals, and dominated the party infrastructure. If you have any doubts, check out his nominations to cabinet officials so far; very few would have been nominated by previous Republican Presidents.
These appointments and Trump’s record-setting 26 executive orders yesterday are part of an intentional shock campaign, much of it straight out of the Project 2025 manual. He attacked perceived enemies, including targeting specific individuals and the non-partisan federal workforce. He pardoned 1,500 violent insurrectionists arrested after the Capitol riots on January 6, 2021, intended to illegally keep Trump in office after he lost the 2020 election. He attacked a wide swath of Biden-era policies deemed “woke.” Perhaps most alarmingly, he attempted to rescind birthright citizenship, which would deny fundamental rights to countless children, and conflicts with long-established understandings of the U.S. Constitution. He also notified his intention to withdraw from the World Health Organization (WHO), rescinded 78 Biden Administration executive actions, and paused all foreign assistance spending for up to 90 days.
Trump also signed multiple climate-related orders, including initiating the revocation of the Biden Administration’s prohibition of fossil fuel drilling in certain areas, pausing all federal wind energy permitting (so much for an all-of-the-above energy policy?), working to undo improved emission standards for cars, and notifying his intention to withdraw from the Paris Agreement.
Adding insult to injury, Trump declared a national emergency around energy prices, in an attempt to use emergency powers to promote fossil fuel production. Fossil energy production is, of course, already at record levels in the US, and any cost-of-living concerns (which are real and, for some, an acute crisis) are the result of utilities setting high prices, which won’t be solved by increasing production.
Among the climate-related executive orders, the Paris Agreement withdrawal is, in many ways, the least consequential in the short term. The Paris Agreement mandates almost no specific action; it’s best understood as a framework for voluntary collaborative action. Slowing or stopping wind energy development, expanding fossil fuel production, and other aspects of Trump’s climate-related orders will have more immediate implications for emissions. However, withdrawing from Paris is still a serious and damaging step that will have long-term repercussions. Climate change is, after all, a global problem that can only be solved via global cooperation.
Trump’s first day is making it clear that he is declaring a mandate despite an incredibly narrow popular vote victory and the smallest margin in the House of Representatives in recent history. Very little of what Trump is unleashing is surprising, but it is not at all clear that this is actually what people wanted when they voted. Voters understandably cannot fully express nuanced policy preferences, built on lived experiences and a shattered information economy, through binary choices at the ballot box.
But frustration at the state of immigration policy is not the same thing as endorsing ending birthright citizenship or mass deportation programs supported by the U.S. military. Frustration with grocery prices does not denote support for drilling in some of the most fragile natural wild places in the country, or opposing “this wind thing”.
Unfortunately, if no one puts up a fight, Trump will continue acting as if he has a mandate for these most extreme versions of his policy platforms. As exhausted and defeated as we may feel, finding ways to act in opposition is crucial to slowing the descent into fascism. Giving in to the “shock and awe” strategy of the administration is simply not an option for those of us who still believe a more just world is possible.
This is going to be a long effort. It’s not all won or lost today. So, refresh and use those self-care checklists. Binge your favorite show and go for a walk. Take care of your people. But dig in. There is work to do.
