Morning Report — Critics tee off on Trump orders 

In today’s issue:   

• Trump’s orders provoke immediate pushback 

• Track and unpack president’s executive orders 

• Fetterman: “I’d make a pretty bad Republican” 

• Rubio gets a running start at State 

Within hours of his inauguration, President Trump’s flurry of executive orders is facing significant pushback from politicians and legal groups. 

On Day 1 of his second administration, Trump signed a slew of actions covering everything from immigration to energy policy. Unlike during Trump’s first term, where opponents of the president were for the first weeks occupied with litigating the controversial “Muslim travel ban,” his second term is dividing their attention with the sheer number of quick executive actions. 

On Monday, the president instituted a plethora of border security laws including the “Remain in Mexico” program which requires asylum-seekers to stay in Mexico until their U.S. immigration court date and to shutting down the CBP One app, which facilitates appointments for immigration proceedings.  

He also pledged to end birthright citizenship, which is guaranteed under the 14th Amendment. On Tuesday, attorneys general from 22 states, as well as Washington, D.C., and San Francisco, sued Trump in two federal district courts to block an executive order that refuses to recognize children of immigrants without legal status who were born in the U.S. as citizens.  

“President Trump now seeks to abrogate this well-established and longstanding Constitutional principle by executive fiat,” one group of states wrote in their complaint. “The principle of birthright citizenship has been enshrined in the Constitution for more than 150 years. The Citizenship Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment unambiguously and expressly confers citizenship on ‘[a]ll persons born’ in and ‘subject to the jurisdiction’ of the United States.” 

Trump also signed a sweeping executive order recognizing only two sexes and preventing government dollars from being spent on what his administration called “gender ideology.” The executive order is part of a broader campaign promise to roll back trans rights and diversity and inclusion initiatives instituted by the Biden administration that Republicans argued went too far. 

Logan Casey, director of policy research at the Movement Advancement Project, a nonprofit that tracks LGBTQ legislation, told The 19th an executive order doesn’t equate to immediate policymaking or new laws — and can be easily challenged in court.  

“They will issue executive orders and actions and other directives, but it will still take time before those things actually become law, if they ever actually go into effect,” he said.  

Meanwhile, the National Treasury Employees Union sued over an executive order creating a new class of federal employees — Schedule F — who can be hired outside the traditional merit-based system for bureaucrats. Federal workers see Schedule F as a way to insert politics into government actions, a move that could both reward Trump allies and politicize government decisionmaking. 

▪ The Hill: The Trump administration has directed that all federal diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) employees be placed on paid leave by Wednesday evening. 

▪ The Hill: Trump's efforts to buck a legislative and Supreme Court deadline by which TikTok's Chinese parent company must sell the popular app raise a slew of legal and practical questions about its future. 

▪ The Hill: Trump is under fire after launching two cryptocurrency tokens shortly before his inauguration.  

▪ The Hill: Four major climate, energy moves included in Trump's day one executive orders. 

▪ The New York Times analysis: Trump is at the peak of his power. The question is for how long? He’s “closer to a lame-duck period than any newly inaugurated predecessor in the modern era. The great uncertainty is how that contradiction plays out… Trump’s honeymoon with the public could last, or his pursuit of so expansive an agenda, so quickly, could spark intense backlash.” 

The unprecedented use of pardons by former President Biden on his last day in office coupled with Trump’s sweeping pardon of violent Jan. 6 offenders on his first day sparked renewed scrutiny of unilateral presidential power. At the stroke of a pen, both presidents’ acts of clemency marked a stark departure from the status quo, stretching the already vast limits of the pardon power and raising alarm among critics and allies alike. 

The Hill: Trump, fulfilling a vow he made to Libertarian voters while reviving his assertions about “weaponization” of justice, on Tuesday pardoned Ross Ulbricht, founder of illicit online black market site Silk Road, who was serving a life sentence.  

On Capitol Hill, Trump's sweeping pardons of Jan. 6, 2021, protesters are putting Republican senators and House members on defense. The president's decision to include people convicted of assaulting police crosses a red line that GOP senators had drawn in recent weeks. Trump's allies on Capitol Hill predicted that Trump would only pardon non-violent offenses, but the president went much further, writes The Hill’s Alexander Bolton. GOP senators want to move on from Jan. 6 and focus on Trump's agenda and confirming his nominees.  

▪ The Hill: Trump pardoned violent Jan. 6 offenders. Here are five of them. 

▪ Axios: The Fraternal Order of Police, the largest police union in the U.S., and the International Association of Chiefs of Police denounced Trump’s Jan. 6 pardons. 

Sen. Thom Tillis (R-N.C.) on Tuesday criticized Trump's decision to pardon individuals who were convicted of assaulting police officers during the Jan. 6 attack. 

“Anybody who was convicted of assault on a police officer, I just can’t get there at all,” Tillis told a reporter for Spectrum News. “I think it was a bad idea.”    

SMART TAKE with NewsNation’s BLAKE BURMAN  

Back in 2009, I was a cub political reporter in local news in Miami and often interacted with a state lawmaker with big dreams. At the time, the prevailing thought was there was no way he could unseat the sitting governor of his own party to become a U.S. senator. 

That lawmaker is now Secretary of State Marco Rubio, the first member of the Trump Cabinet to be confirmed.  

Rubio’s tenure at the State Department started off with a light moment Tuesday. After speaking in Spanish, he looked at Vice President Vance and joked: “I just said I saved a bunch of money by switching to GEICO.”  

Trump's top diplomat stares down a global map that includes seeing a ceasefire through in the Middle East and ending the war in Ukraine. His boss has also brought Greenland, the Panama Canal and even Canada to the forefront of political conversations. 

Rubio has been around the political block but in his new role could encounter a diplomatic landscape we have never seen before.   

Burman hosts “The Hill” weeknights, 6p/5c on NewsNation. The Hill & NewsNation are owned by Nexstar Media Group. 

3 THINGS TO KNOW TODAY  

▪ Trump said Tuesday he intends on Feb. 1 to impose a 10 percent tariff on Chinese imports into the United States.  

▪ Trump’s Justice Department has reassigned at least 20 senior officials across multiple divisions in a leadership shakeup that precedes Senate confirmation of an attorney general. 

▪ Clubby: At least 16 billionaires, officials from eight countries, 14 of Trump’s Cabinet choices, 22 governors, eight senators and 65 members of the House visited Mar-a-Lago between Trump’s November election and his inauguration. 

LEADING THE DAY 

TRACKING THE NEW AGENDA: Trump’s mashup of unilateral orders and decrees as of Tuesday have been sorted and summarized by The Hill: 26 executive orders with the temporary effect of law; 12 memos; four proclamations and the president’s withdrawal of 78 executive actions signed by his predecessor.  

Wondering how executive orders work and how they can be overturned? The Washington Post explains. 

Is Trump’s order to change birthright citizenship likely to succeed? Experts outline why the U.S. Constitution, Supreme Court precedent and the law raise doubts about the president’s legal ability to bar citizenship to children born in the U.S. to parents who do not have legal status. 

Immigration arrests and deportations are underway (and the Trump administration is spreading the word as a way to deter migration and to encourage those without legal status to voluntarily exit the U.S.). White House immigration czar Tom Homan appeared to confirm during a Tuesday interview with CNN that Immigration and Customs Enforcement will identify, arrest and deport migrants without legal status regardless of whether they are charged with crimes or are in the United States while seeking asylum. Immigration authorities may enter schools, healthcare facilities and places of worship to conduct arrests, according to a new policy from the Trump-led Department of Homeland Security. Homan said that so-called sanctuary cities that try to shield migrants will see more “collateral arrests.” 

Trump said the federal government will recognize two sexes and no other options for official federal purposes including passports and documents. What does that mean?  Note that as of Tuesday, the government’s Biden-era online passport application had not changed. 

Artificial intelligence: Days before leaving office, Biden urged Trump to keep the U.S. government “in the lead” with AI rather than turning to “offshore” entities. On Tuesday at the White House, Trump announced a partnership among three major business leaders — SoftBank Group CEO Masayoshi Son, OpenAI CEO Sam Altman and Oracle Corp. Chair Larry Ellison — to create a new company called Stargate based in Texas with up to $500 billion in private investment over four years. 

"What we want to do is we want to keep it in this country,” Trump said in the Roosevelt Room while appearing with the three businessmen. “China is a competitor, others are competitors. We want to be in this country.” 

Cabinet: The Senate failed to reach an agreement Tuesday night to swiftly vote on the nomination of John Ratcliffe to be CIA director. Senators now plan to work into the weekend to try to confirm more of Trump’s Cabinet nominees. Senate Democrats are using procedural hurdles, which require time for consideration of each nomination. Defense Department appointee Pete Hegseth, who advanced Monday along party lines in the Senate Armed Services Committee, has denied new allegations posed in an affidavit signed by a former sister-in-law. Senate Republicans anticipate a floor vote on Hegseth’s nomination by week’s end. 

WHERE AND WHEN 

• The House convenes at 10 a.m.  
• The Senate meets at 11 a.m.  
• The president today will record a Fox News interview from the Oval Office with Sean Hannity for broadcast at 9 p.m. ET. 

ZOOM IN 

Sen. John Fetterman (D-Pa.) is not going to switch parties. That was his reaction Monday to Semafor’s question about rumors following his recent Florida meeting with Trump. “That’s amateur hour sh--,” he said. The senator, who has pointed out that he does not represent only the Democrats living in his state, added, “It’s not going to happen. And even if I wanted to do that, this is a rocket sled to Palookaville to try and switch — I would make a pretty bad Republican.” 

Republican Rep. Andy Biggs, a member of the House Freedom Caucus who has represented Arizona’s 5th Congressional District since 2017, on Tuesday filed a statement of interest to run for governor of his state in 2026. He’s one of the first major names to formally file a statement of interest in the race. 

Trump’s Tuesday firings: Adm. Linda Fagan, commandant of the Coast Guard, was removed from her position. Trump, through acting Homeland Security Secretary Benjamine Huffman, appointed Adm. Kevin Lunday to serve as acting commandant. Fagan had served in the leadership role since June 2022 and was the first uniformed woman to lead a military branch. Fox News reported that the new administration viewed her as ineffective in the deployment of Coast Guard assets to support national border security, including in intercepting fentanyl and other illicit substances.  

Trump used social media Tuesday to fire a collection of Biden-appointed members of various councils and boards, including Brian Hook, a top envoy to Iran during his first term, and retired Gen. Mark Milley, whom Trump selected to be chair of the Joint Chiefs of Staff in 2018 before Milley became a prominent critic. Trump, while a candidate, suggested Milley should be court-martialed and executed. 

Trump fired Hook for unspecified reasons from the Wilson Center and Milley from the National Infrastructure Advisory Council. The president said he jettisoned former Atlanta Mayor Keisha Lance Bottoms (who previously worked in the Biden White House as an adviser) from the President’s Export Council. He also said he fired humanitarian and chef José Andrés from the President’s Council on Sports, Fitness and Nutrition, although the founder of World Central Kitchen said on social media that he resigned earlier this month. (The Trump Organization and the chef until 2017 had been in a lengthy legal battle over a restaurant contract.)    

North Carolina politics: A skirmish has erupted over a state Supreme Court race in the Tar Heel State more than two months after Democrats narrowly clinched the seat. Justice Allison Riggs, the Democratic incumbent, finished just 734 votes ahead of her Republican challenger, Jefferson Griffin, with more than 5 million votes cast in the race — making it one of the closest in the country. But a lawsuit from Griffin has prevented the state elections board from certifying Riggs as the winner after two recounts confirmed her lead, writes The Hill’s Jared Gans. Now Democrats accuse the GOP of attempting to overturn the results to nab a court seat.  

White House website makeover: Under Trump, the White House website has been overhauled, with traces of the Biden administration removed and a new page added that declares “America Is Back.” The contrasts are stark. Instead of “tackling the climate crisis,” the website now has a pledge to end “policies of climate extremism.” 

Replacing Biden’s boasts that the White House had “forged historic partnerships” and “restored American leadership” is Trump’s declaration that the U.S. will “no longer be beholden to foreign organizations.” 

Also gone: The Spanish-language version of the website, the landing page for the Constitution and all mentions of LGBTQ issues. The government website reproductiverights.gov also appeared to be offline as of this morning. The site, launched in 2022 by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services as part of a public awareness campaign, contained information about access to abortion and reproductive healthcare. 

Courts: Florida Judge Aileen Cannon halted the release to lawmakers of the Justice Department’s Trump classified documents evidence, which was a step former Attorney General Merrick Garland had planned to take if he had received court approval before the end of the Biden administration.   

ELSEWHERE 

FOREIGN AID: Trump on Monday signed an executive order suspending any new U.S. foreign development assistance for three months and directed a review of foreign assistance programs. The order pausing funding follows an executive order directing the State Department to implement an “America First foreign policy,” although the specifics of that policy are not defined. 

The executive order includes a waiver for the secretary of State to waive the rules for “specific programs.”  

Meanwhile, fresh from taking an oath of office, Rubio hit the ground running Tuesday with meetings with counterparts in the Quadrilateral Security Dialogue, known as the Quad, which includes India, Australia and Japan, a bloc formed to counter Chinese clout in the Indo-Pacific. All the Quad foreign ministers were in attendance at Trump’s inauguration, seated close to the front. 

GAZA CEASEFIRE: Burned-out buildings — reduced to rubble — were all that was left to return to in northern Gaza for thousands of displaced Palestinians who made the journey on foot this week as a tentative ceasefire between Israel and Hamas paused the fighting in the enclave. The United Nations estimates around 90 percent of Gaza's population — almost 1.9 million people — have been displaced from their homes. The U.N. previously estimated that around 60 percent of the enclave’s infrastructure has been destroyed, including schools and hospitals. 

“Everything is destroyed as you can see. Nothing remains,” Asma Qaoud told NBC News on Monday in what remained of the Jabalia refugee camp. “Everything has been devastated — our homes and our hearts.” 

Hamas said four more female Israeli hostages will be freed this weekend in return for Palestinian prisoners while Trump said he was not confident that the ceasefire deal he personally insisted on would hold. Seven Israeli women remain on the list of the initial group of 33 hostages designated for release in the first phase of the three-part truce, which includes women, children and elderly and sick people. 

Meanwhile, Israeli security forces on Tuesday embarked on a military operation in Jenin, a Palestinian city in the Israeli-occupied West Bank. The operation comes amid sharply rising tensions in the West Bank, as the militants have grown in power and settler violence against Palestinian civilians has soared. On Monday, Trump rescinded sanctions imposed by the Biden administration on dozens of far-right Israeli individuals and settler groups accused of violence against Palestinians. 

▪ The Washington Post: Google employees have worked to provide Israel’s military with access to the company’s latest artificial intelligence technology from the early weeks of the war in Gaza. 

▪ The Wall Street Journal: Hamas is effectively back in control in Gaza. With no alternative following a ceasefire with Israel, the militant group has a moment to assert power. 

OPINION  

▪ Trump just pardoned himself, by Jeffrey Toobin, guest essayist, The New York Times. 

▪ Here’s how TikTok can still save itself, by Rep. John Moolenaar (R-Mich.), opinion contributor, The Hill.   

THE CLOSER 

And finally … Without a maximus kerfuffle, can Trump order the Gulf of America to rise from the Gulf of Mexico? Perhaps. 

The International Hydrographic Organization, which oversees naming conventions for bodies of water worldwide, permits countries to refer to the same location by different, preferred names. If the Sea of Japan is known as the East Sea in some countries, the Gulf of Mexico could be just as fluid.  

The U.S. Board on Geographic Names oversees the approval of official names for geographical features within the United States, with exacting rules. 

Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis (R) floated his implicit endorsement of Trump’s decree while describing this week’s cold weather in the South: "An area of low pressure moving across the Gulf of America, interacting with Arctic air, will bring widespread impactful weather to North Florida beginning Tuesday," he said. 

Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum, during a Tuesday news conference, reacted to Trump’s order with bemusement. “He says that he will call it the Gulf of America on [the U.S.] continental shelf,” she said. “For us, it is still the Gulf of Mexico and for the entire world, it is still the Gulf of Mexico.” 

Stay Engaged  

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