Trump's Week 1 actions reward his MAGA base and settle scores
President Donald Trump’s first week in office isn’t yet over, but he fulfilled his plan to “flood the zone” with a deluge of executive actions.
WASHINGTON — President Donald Trump’s first week in office isn’t yet over, but he fulfilled his plan to “flood the zone” with a deluge of executive actions designed to sweep in his second term and wash away the Biden era.
If Americans are feeling the sense of “shock and awe” Trump advisers say they hoped to instill, they should not be surprised. These actions — from beginning the process of deporting undocumented immigrants to pardoning political supporters and repealing dozens of Biden’s executive orders — were largely included in Trump’s campaign agenda as he sought a historic return to the Oval Office following his 2020 ouster. In short, Trump is serving his political base and settling old scores with new policies.
“We all have a little bit of a chip on our shoulder, no one bigger than him,” White House deputy chief of staff Taylor Budowich said in a telephone interview with NBC News.
But the Week 1 actions, which included mass pardons of the Jan. 6 convicts and anti-abortion activists, represented the low-hanging fruit. And while Trump is committed to controlling the narrative of his presidency by commanding attention at all times, he is already starting to see the challenges of implementing his agenda.
A federal judge this week temporarily blocked a first-day Trump order redefining the 14th Amendment’s grant of citizenship to anyone born in the U.S., calling it “blatantly unconstitutional.” On Thursday, Mexico refused to provide landing rights to a U.S. military plane loaded with deportees, according to two defense officials and a third person familiar with the situation. (A White House official said it was "an administrative issue and was quickly rectified.)
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