129 Executive Orders So Far: An Overview

A recap of orders affecting foreign policy, the federal workforce, immigration, energy and climate, elections, trans people, and education. Almost 200 lawsuits challenging the orders are ongoing.

As of last week, President Trump has issued 129 executive orders. We’ve covered some in detail in past articles already. Today we’re taking the big picture view of what’s happened since Trump took office.

What is an executive order?

Executive orders are directives from the President to agencies within the Executive Branch of the federal government. These orders can set policy priorities and instruct agencies on how to carry out laws passed by Congress, within the bounds of the Constitution and the law. They are subject to not only judicial scrutiny but the possibility that Congress may change the law on which an executive order is based.

And many of these orders have been challenged in court. In separate cases recently, the Supreme Court ruled that the government cannot move detained people out of the country before providing the detainees the opportunity to challenge their deportations in court, after the Trump Administration defied a court order to not do so. Almost 200 other cases are ongoing, with several preliminary rulings halting Trump Administrative actions. (We’ll leave those for a future article.)

So where has Trump focused these executive orders?

Foreign policy is the most frequent topic of executive orders thus far, ranging from on-again off-again tariffs (which accounts for more than 10 orders), to the removal of the United States from international organizations (14155, 14162, 14199), to terrorist designations and sanctions (14157, 14175, 14204). For example, the International Criminal Court (ICC) has issued arrest warrants against Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu for alleged war crimes committed by the Israeli military in Gaza. Trump issued an order blocking the assets of entities that “assist” with the ICC’s investigations of alleged Israeli war crimes.

The federal workforce has seen record cuts of tens of thousands of federal employees following an executive order to scale back by cutting staff. The same order instructs agency heads to coordinate new hires through the new United States Department of Government Efficiency Service, the White House team purportedly not run by billionaire Elon Musk. Trump also issued an executive order instructing several government entities to drastically reduce their staff and functions, and most recently signed an order seeking to invalidate union contracts for federal workers and ordering government agencies to cease collective bargaining.

Immigration enforcement has taken an aggressive turn with hundreds of immigrants facing deportation without due process, including Green Card holders. A directive issued by the Department of Homeland Security in response to Trump’s executive orders on immigration rescinded a 2011 policy which prevented ICE agents from raiding schools and churches. In addition to detentions and deportations, Trump signed an order to pause the refugee admissions program which allows immigrants fleeing dangerous situations to claim asylum and enter the U.S. legally. Meanwhile, he set the stage for military action on the Southern border by ordering the Secretary of Defense to create a plan to seal the border and giving the military jurisdiction over public land along the border. The military has historically provided logistical support to Border Patrol, and cannot by law be used for domestic law enforcement, but this order establishes a priority for U.S. armed forces to defend the border themselves.

Fossil fuel energy production takes precedence over climate science, as one of Trump’s first executive orders was to declare a state of emergency for American energy production, even though we have exported more energy resources than we imported every year since 2019. Under this emergency, he has authorized the use of federal lands such as national parks and conservation areas for energy production and ordered agency heads to review regulations and policies which impede the production of fossil fuels and implement plans to suspend or rescind those hurdles. At the same time, Trump is calling for an expansion of “all forms of reliable and affordable energy production” to establish “global energy dominance”, and calling for the Attorney General to “stop enforcement of state laws” on climate change. He has also signed an order requiring agencies to add or include conditional sunset dates on existing and new energy-related regulations, which would expire the regulations unless they are reviewed with public input.

The Department of Justice has been ordered to investigate law firms representing clients in opposition to Trump or his agenda (14230, 14237, 14244, 14246, 14250, 14263) and expand citizenship verification and enforcement of voting laws in federal elections.

Trans people are also being targeted. Among his day-one orders, one order defined “women,” for the purposes of federal programs, as people “belonging, at conception, to the … immutable biological classification … that produces the large reproductive cell,” and “men” as those who produce “the small reproductive cell.” This definition intentionally excludes trans and nonbinary people, and perhaps unintentionally people with intersex conditions, who probably make up about 1 to 2% of the population. Days later Trump signed an order to remove trans people from the military because they allegedly aren’t capable of meeting the physical or emotional requirements of service — thousands of trans people are currently serving. He also instructed the Department of Health and Human services to end gender affirming care for minors.

Education is being impacted by orders for agencies to prioritize “patriotic education” over “radical indoctrination” such as topics like unconscious bias. The Secretary of Education has been ordered to evaluate how federal grants can be used to fund “private and faith-based” schools. Museums such as the Smithsonian Institution are being scorned for exhibits which “degrade American values, divide Americans based on race, or promote programs or ideologies inconsistent with Federal law and policy.” One example of this named in the order is an exhibit on art’s role in shaping attitudes on race.