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- [00:04]
Luke Vargas
Donald Trump kickstarts his second term with a flurry of day one executive orders.
- [00:10]
Donald Trump
You're witnessing the dawn of the golden age of America. That's what it's going to be. We're bringing it back. We're going to bring it back fast.
- [00:21]
Luke Vargas
Plus, China changes its tune on the potential sale of TikTok. And an update on this weekend's Gaza ceasefire. It's Tuesday, January 21st. I'm Luke Vargas for the Wall Wall Street Journal and here is the AM edition of what's news, the top headlines and business stories moving your world today. Just hours after being sworn into office at the Capitol Rotunda, President Donald Trump got the ball rolling yesterday on his agenda, signing a series of executive orders touching on immigration, trade, energy, government reform and much more. Journal Trade and Economic Policy reporter Gavin Bade was tracking first day actions as the president put his pen to paper at events across D.C. including at a raucous evening rally at a downtown arena. And he joins us now to walk through some of the highlights. Gavin, let's begin with immigration, shall we? This is something Trump brought up during his inaugural speech and that he got to work on quickly via several executive orders. Talk to us about the steps that he's taken there.
- [01:27]
Gavin Bade
Yeah, absolutely. This is one of the cornerstones of Trump's campaign, is dealing with immigration and issues at the border and was the subject of some of his most far reaching and significant executive orders on Monday. The most significant is declaring an emergency at the US Mexico border and ordering some very constitutionally contentious things, announcing that he would seek to end birthright citizenship, announcing that he would carry out a series of immigration raids, although he didn't give details on those. And then designating some Mexican cartels, he said he would designate them as foreign terrorist organizations, potentially setting the stage for some military intervention south of the border. So a lot of uncertainty around these things, both from a legal and feasibility standpoint. But he certainly wasted no time laying down the gauntlet, so to speak, on immigration.
- [02:17]
Luke Vargas
Gavin, as you hinted at there, a number of the actions that Trump took yesterday, be it on immigration or other things, are likely to be challenged in court. Immigration rights groups, for instance, have already sued to stop the end of birthright citizenship. Switching gears from the emergency declaration at the southern border. Let's talk about the fact that Trump also declared a national energy emergency. What exactly does that mean? What did he announce?
- [02:42]
Gavin Bade
Yes, mostly the energy executive orders and the emergency designation has to do with streamlining, siting and construction of energy projects, specifically fossil fuel projects. He empowers A lot of his agency heads, once they're confirmed, to cut through a lot of red tape and disregard local or national environmental protocols when citing these projects. His view is that the US can do a lot more in producing energy, specifically oil and gas, despite the fact that the US Is producing more oil and gas than at any point in its history. We also expect him to end the Biden administration's pause on liquefied natural gas exports. And that's something that the industry certainly thinks can be a big source of growth, also an important part of his foreign policy. Trump said in the Oval Office after signing some of these orders that he really wants China to purchase more US Energy products, specifically oil and gas. And that's one way that they can make up the purchase requirements of the so called phase one trade deal that Beijing signed with Trump in 20. So energy is going to be a focus throughout here.
- [03:47]
Luke Vargas
All right. Some projects getting off the ground, President Trump halting others, like America's offshore wind expansion. Kind of part of an effort, Gavin, by the new president to undo President Biden's green agenda more broadly.
- [03:59]
Gavin Bade
Yes. President Trump also signed orders ending what he would call the EV mandate or regulations from the EPA and the Department of Transportation on tailpipe standards, emission standards for new vehicles. And that would have meant an influx of electric vehicles one way or another. So Trump will seek to take those regulations off the books and then has also pledged to roll back a lot of the electric vehicle funding in the Biden administration's inflation Reduction Act. Of course, he will need an act of Congress to do that. That's one of the things that kind of remains uncertain as we go forward here.
- [04:34]
Luke Vargas
All right. There's so much else that we don't have time to get to. So I will point everyone to our show notes where we've got a link to a Wall Street Journal. All of President Trump's executive orders from day one, which includes an order that would end DEI programs across the federal government. The withdrawal of the US from the Paris Climate Agreement, plans to rename Denali, the mountain in Alaska as Mount McKinley, as well as the Gulf of Mexico becoming the Gulf of America. The president ordering a review of U.S. law enforcement and intelligence agencies to see if any of their moves under the Biden administration were politically motivated. And then on the functioning of the US Government, Gavin, we saw the Elon Musk led Department of Government Efficiency get a kickstart along with early attempts to reform the federal bureaucracy.
- [05:17]
Gavin Bade
Yes, the most significant actions on that front have to do with a federal hiring freeze that Trump signed on Monday saying that at least for the time being, the federal government's not going to be hiring any more bureaucrats. Of course, he exempted the US Military from that declaration. And then in addition to that, he also signed an order that would set up some DOGE teams, Department of Government efficiency teams that will be embedded at agencies throughout the federal government, sort of cost cutters in chief at each one of these federal agencies. So it'll be interesting to see how that plays out over the next few months as well.
- [05:50]
Luke Vargas
That will certainly be interesting to watch. Gavin, finally, what else stood out to you in terms of what we heard yesterday, or maybe what we didn't?
- [05:58]
Gavin Bade
One of the most surprising things was something that did not happen in Trump's slew of executive orders, and that was any new tariffs on foreign nations. Right off the bat, however, he renewed the threat to impose 25% tariffs on Canada and Mexico, and he said they would probably do that by February 1st. And so a 25% tariff is something that's very, very scary for people in Ottawa, Mexico City, and also in many trade reliant US Industries. I think you're gonna see a flood of lobbying and calls on that in the next few days.
- [06:30]
Luke Vargas
Day one and the tariff countdown clock is already ticking. Journal reporter Gavin Bade covers trade and economic policy for us. Gavin, thank you so much for the time.
- [06:39]
Gavin Bade
Thanks, Luke. It's a pleasure to be here.
- [06:41]
Luke Vargas
Coming up, we've got the rest of the day's news, including updates on Trump's cab TikTok's fate and the market reaction to the change in administrations. That and more after the break.
- [06:56]
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- [07:17]
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- [07:30]
Luke Vargas
Well, in addition to a raft of executive actions, President Trump yesterday pardoned nearly all of the roughly 1500 people charged in connection with the January 6, 2021 attack on the US Capitol. The sweeping clemency effectively wipes away four years of prosecutions, including more than 1,100 conv. And contradicts the case by case approach that Trump and his allies had signaled ahead of his inauguration. Some Trump allies had also voiced opposition to pardoning defendants who had assaulted police officers, more than 140 of whom were injured in the riot. Trump's proclamation followed a last minute move by outgoing President Joe Biden to immunize members of his family and high profile officials from potential prosecution by the new administration. Biden acknowledged the extraordinary nature of the preemptive party to those not charged with wrongdoing, but said he couldn't stand by as they faced threats of retribution. Among those on the pardon list were Dr. Anthony Fauci, who helped lead efforts to fight the COVID 19 pandemic retired General Mark Milley, who Trump suggested should face death for treason and members of the House committee that investigated the January 6 Capitol riot, as well as police officers who testified. The Senate has confirmed Florida Senator Marco Rubio as secretary of state by a vote of 99 0, making him President Trump's first cabinet member. Rubio won the trust of his colleagues thanks to his traditional views on foreign policy issues and tough stance on China. Meanwhile, Trump's nominee to run the Central Intelligence Agency, John Ratcliffe, and his defense secretary pick Pete Hegseth, have both inched closer to taking office after Senate panels yesterday advanced their nominations to the full Senate. Hegseth, Trump's most controversial cabinet pick, survived a 1413 party line vote in the Senate Armed Services Committee and could be confirmed by week's end. A fragile ceasefire in Gaza between Israel and Hamas is continuing to hold after coming into effect over the weekend. Three Israeli hostages, all women, were released on Sunday in a chaotic handover, the first of 33 captives set to be freed over six weeks in exchange for hundreds of Palestinian prisoners. President Trump appeared to take credit for the hostage release during his inaugural speech yesterday, predicting that his legacy would be that of a peacemaker and unifier, though in later remarks at the White House, he tamped down expectations that the current deal would hold. How confident are you, Mr. President, that you can keep the ceasefire in Gaza and conclude the three phases of this deal?
- [10:14]
Donald Trump
I'm not confident that's not our words. They were, but I'm not confident President.
- [10:19]
Luke Vargas
Trump is giving TikTok 75 more days to work out a deal to prevent it from going offline in the US in an executive order yesterday, Trump directed the attorney general not to enforce a January 19 ban of the app, which led it to briefly go dark over the weekend before Trump signaled he would take action to keep it online. And now Journal Asia tech reporter Stu Wu says that Beijing's long standing position that it would block a forced sale of TikTok appears to be shifting in response to comments from Trump that he'd like US and Chinese interests to split control of the app 5050.
- [10:57]
Stu Wu
What happened yesterday is that a spokeswoman for the Chinese government said, actually we think that private companies should be able to figure out their own solution. So that was a hint that they might be opening up to this idea of maybe a sale, maybe a joint venture for TikTok in the United States. We've reported that Chinese government officials have internally discussed the idea that Elon Musk could be this US investor that could have partial ownership in TikTok. The Chinese government would be okay with that, but we don't know whether the Chinese government has actually discussed this actual idea of Elon Musk or the leadership of TikTok's parent company, ByteDance.
- [11:31]
Luke Vargas
In markets news, oil prices are falling after President Trump laid out plans yesterday to boost American oil and gas production. The Journal's Chelsea Delaney says that's just one of several ways that potential policy shifts under the new administration are already making waves.
- [11:47]
Chelsea Delaney
One of the biggest so called Trump trades was this huge run up in bitcoin. We did see bitcoin rise to a new intraday record yesterday was almost at 110,000. It's come back a bit today, but really where investors are focused right now is on trade and tariffs. We're seeing the Canadian dollar and the Mexican peso in particular getting hit hard in the currency market. So for investors, this definitely shows that Trump is serious about implementing tariffs and that has a whole range of ramifications for the economy, for inflation and particularly for these overseas economies that are quite dependent on sales to the US and.
- [12:24]
Luke Vargas
It is shaping up to be a busy earnings day with Charles Schwab and 3M reporting before the opening bell, followed by Netflix, United Airlines and Capital One after the close. And that's it for what's news for this Tuesday morning. Additional sound in this episode was from Reuters. Today's show was produced by Kate Bullifant. Our supervising producer was Daniel Bach. And I'm Luke Vargas for the Wall Street Journal. We will be back tonight with a new show. Until then, thanks for list.