President Trump has spent his first five days in office delivering on some of the promises that built his campaign from a novelty into a populist movement, from cracking down on illegal immigration to withdrawing the U.S. from a deeply unpopular trade alliance.
But his toughest fights lay ahead, with Democrats in Congress already signaling their intention to resist Trump’s legislative agenda and members of his own party pushing back preemptively on a handful of proposals.
And Trump’s efforts to revive speculation about illegal voting has distracted from his early victories.
Trump touched off a fierce debate about voter fraud, social media and the power of the presidency on Wednesday after he announced via Twitter that he will ask his administration for a “major investigation” of the voting system. His chief spokesman, press secretary Sean Spicer, had told reporters one day earlier that the president continues to believe millions of voters cast illegal ballots in the election last year, fueling discussion of whether the White House would act on what Trump’s opponents have dismissed as a conspiracy theory.
For now, the new president is doing all he can to implement his policies without the help of Capitol Hill and, in many cases, without the help of confirmed Cabinet members.
“I think clearly he came out of the box in a big way and accomplished a significant amount in the first couple of days, and I think that he deserves a lot of credit for that,” said Sean Noble, a Republican strategist.
That’s why Trump should focus more on the political victories he’s currently notching and less on litigations of the past, like whether illegal ballots may have cost him the popular vote, Noble said.
“He won a pretty resounding election under the system that’s put in place. It was a pretty healthy win,” Noble said. “I consider it pretty darn close to a landslide.”
“The administration would do well for themselves to focus on what they’re accomplishing as they govern and not worry about whether they have a mandate or not, because they can take the mandate and run with it,” he added.
Trump has certainly exercised his executive authority as if he has a mandate in the first few days of his presidency.
The new president took the first step toward slashing Obama-era regulations — a cornerstone of his job creation plan — within hours of taking office by issuing a regulatory freeze for all federal agencies. The move prevented departments from finalizing all pending rules from the previous administration.
Trump then instructed agencies to stop enforcing aspects of Obamacare as Congress prepares to replace it with a highly-anticipated alternative plan. Even before being sworn in, Trump had heartened Obamacare’s foes by publicly nudging House and Senate Republicans toward a condensed timeline for repealing and replacing the law, ending speculation that they may repeal the Affordable Care Act long before arriving at a consensus for its replacement.
Over the weekend, Trump began shaping his administration’s foreign policy by conducting some telephone diplomacy: he spoke with Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, Mexican President Enrique Pena Nieto and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and announced a meeting slated for later in the week with British Prime Minister Theresa May.
His conversations with Trudeau and Pena Nieto laid the groundwork for upcoming negotiations over the future of the North American Free Trade Agreement, another in a series of “stupid deals” for which Trump had blamed the exodus of manufacturing jobs that hit the heartland over the past two decades.
Trump delivered on one of his most concrete and oft-stated campaign promises Monday when he issued a notice of intent to withdraw the U.S. from the Trans-Pacific Partnership. By book-ending the withdrawal with “listening sessions” that engaged both corporate leaders and union bosses, Trump doubled down on his pledge to be “the greatest jobs president God ever created.”
He followed up on Tuesday with a third listening session, this one involving executives from U.S. automakers.
“Donald Trump, in just a few days, proved that speech after speech during the campaign wasn’t just to get him elected,” said Gianno Caldwell, a Republican strategist. “He’s kept his commitment through his executive order to pull out of the job-killing TPP, as well as the too-expensive Obamacare.”
Caldwell also pointed to the Pentagon’s announcement that coalition forces carried out more than two-dozen air strikes against the Islamic State on Sunday as proof that Trump had been “sincere about his desire to defeat ISIS.”
Trump’s early reliance on executive authority has rankled a number of advocacy groups who have long opposed his populist proposals. Environmental groups quickly denounced Trump’s actions on Tuesday related to the Keystone XL and Dakota Access pipelines, two controversial construction projects that had withered in the previous administration amid an outcry from green groups.
His Keystone XL pipeline action invited TransCanada, the Canadian company that had sought permission to build the pipe, to reapply for a construction permit.
Directives went out to the secretary of commerce on Tuesday regarding the use of U.S. steel in pipeline construction and the “streamlining” of manufacturing permits — even before Wilbur Ross, Trump’s nominee for that position, has gotten a confirmation vote.
One came in the form of a memorandum that instructed Ross to “develop a plan” that would require new, updated or expanded pipeline projects to use American steel and equipment “to the maximum extent possible and to the extent permitted by law.”
Trump’s immigration-related actions drew fire from many of the same pro-immigration groups and Democratic lawmakers that criticized the president’s proposals throughout the campaign. On Wednesday, he signed one order calling for “the immediate construction of a physical wall on the southern border” and the expansion of detention centers near the border. The president signed a second order suspending federal grants from so-called “sanctuary cities,” or areas that intentionally avoid enforcing immigration laws.
During a speech before agents at the Department of Homeland Security headquarters, Trump asked border patrol agents to begin enforcing all immigration laws currently on the books.
With the pair of executive orders he signed on Wednesday, Trump added immigration to the list of areas where he has delivered results, including his actions on trade, energy, jobs, deregulation and healthcare.
But many of the promises from Trump’s inaugural address and, more broadly, from his campaign, will be far more difficult to realize in the coming weeks. That’s because much of what remains will require the cooperation of Congress to become law.
Here are some of the battles on Trump’s horizon:
Infrastructure: Fiscal conservatives have already bristled at the idea of spending billions on an infrastructure package without cutting the federal budget elsewhere. And despite expressing support for a massive infrastructure plan independently, congressional Democrats are likely reluctant to hand Trump a political victory by helping him pass such a plan.
Obamacare: The hardest work lies ahead. Democrats are opposed to any changes in the healthcare system that could imperil coverage levels or Medicaid expansions. The executive action Trump signed on Friday was more a symbolic shot across Obamacare’s bow than a way to dismantle the healthcare law.
Immigration: Trump can repeal Obama’s executive actions but will need cooperation from Congress to implement any meaningful reforms. One Obama executive order, in particular, has already become a minefield for Trump because it provides protections to children brought to the U.S. illegally, making it a tough policy to gut.
Manufacturing: Trump’s push for a 35 percent tariff on goods made overseas by U.S. companies that have shuttered American plants has already met resistance from Republicans who argue that such a policy would cut against the GOP’s free-market principles.
But Noble said lawmakers on Capitol Hill resist Trump’s agenda at their own peril.
“He’s laying down the gauntlet,” Noble said of the president. “Now Congress either goes along, or it becomes the whipping boy for why things haven’t changed.”
