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On Monday, just hours after his inauguration, President Donald Trump signed nearly 100 executive orders, overturning 78 Joe Biden-era orders, and fulfilled campaign promises from declaring a state of emergency at the United States’ southern border to pardoning Jan. 6 insurrectionists.

In his first days in the Oval Office, Trump has pushed the limits of presidential power to historic levels, Margaret Talev, the Kramer Director of Syracuse University’s Institute for Democracy, Journalism and Citizenship, said. Several of Trump’s orders – such as ending birthright citizenship, which is protected by the 14th Amendment, and asserting that the U.S. government will only recognize two genders — immediately faced legal scrutiny.

“(Trump) certainly has indicated that he feels empowered because of everything that has happened … Americans re-elected him, not just with the electoral vote, but with the popular vote,” Talev said. “He takes that as a sign that people want him to test the rules, break the rules, make new rules — do things differently than people expect presidents to do them.”

Following his inauguration, Trump overrode numerous federal laws. These included the Supreme Court’s unanimous upholding of a federal ban on the Chinese-owned social media platform TikTok by issuing a 75-day delay in deciding the app’s fate. The president also referred to asylum seekers as “invaders” and declared that newly arrived migrants couldn’t request asylum, a right protected by American law.

Every American president expands the power of the executive branch. As the nation’s most powerful person, a president typically leaves the position with more authority and power than their predecessor.

Following the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks, former President George W. Bush signed the controversial Patriot Act, granting government agencies unprecedented power to surveil and monitor Americans as the nation as the “war on terror” began.

In July 2014, the United States House of Representatives filed a lawsuit against then-President Barack Obama. The law claimed he was failing to execute laws as Congress saw fit, abusing executive orders and refusing to cooperate with the Republican-controlled House.

Charlie Savage, a New York Times presidential power specialist, reported that executive orders can’t create new powers for the president, raising questions about the legality of multiple day-one orders signed by the new president. As Obama learned in 2014, Congress historically expects the executive branch to uphold the laws it passes.

With Republicans in control of both the House and Senate and a conservative-leaning judiciary, it remains unclear where lawmakers will set limits on presidential power.

Tyler Toledo, president of SU Campus Democrats, said congressional and judicial responses to the executive orders that overstep presidential power — such as the TikTok decision — will test Trump’s influence in other branches of government.

Under federal law, app stores distributing TikTok in the U.S. were to be fined up to $5,000 for every user to access the app beginning Jan. 19. While lawsuits remain a possibility, it’s unclear whether Trump will be sued by Congress or a third party group.

“Who’s going to enforce the fine?” Toledo said. “It gets into a sort of constitutional crisis, if nobody is going to be enforcing a law that was passed by Congress, then does all of this stuff just become optional?”

The College Republicans at Syracuse University did not provide comment.

Trump enters office without eligibility to run for re-election. If election trends persist, the Republican party is likely to lose control of at least one chamber of Congress in the 2026 midterms. As a result, the president’s ability to pursue his legislative agenda will likely be limited to the first half of his term.

The new administration’s actions on its first day show an understanding of the limited window for widespread control, Talev said. She added that many of Trump’s executive orders would have made headlines but were overshadowed by the sheer amount released.

“Tactically, it’s harder for critics to have a stage for their criticism when there are 25 actions that are all controversial, rather than all the attention focused on one,” Talev said. “That was by design, and it shows that (Trump) is trying to learn from the lessons of his first term and correct in a way that gives him even more power to control the narrative this time around.”

Amid the mountain of executive orders, Talev urged college students to read the documents themselves. All executive orders are available on the White House’s website.

Published on January 22, 2025 at 11:37 pm

Contact Duncan: digreen@syr.edu