President Trump's First Week In Office Saw Him Sign These Controversial Orders
In his first week in office, with a series of executive actions, Donald Trump has made the most controversial reforms of any president's first days in office in living memory.
By Sadho Ram — 27 Jan 2017, 01:50 PM
On Monday, President Trump signed an anti-abortion executive order that has far-reaching consequences for women's reproductive health access worldwide
Named as the Mexico City policy, it is also known as the global gag rule, which was first put in place by President Ronald Reagan in 1984.
This global gag rule prohibits giving U.S. funding to international nongovernmental organisations (NGOs) that offer or advise on a wide range of family planning and reproductive health options if they include abortion ― even if U.S. dollars are not specifically used for abortion-related services.
Trump's this executive order is likely to cause women around the world to die, especially in developing countries and conflict zones, where girls, in the absence of safe abortion, are forced to resort to dangerous methods of ending their pregnancies.
According to the WHO, more than 21 million women a year have unsafe abortions in developing countries, accounting for about 13% of all maternal deaths.
On Tuesday, Trump issued an executive order to revive the controversial Dakota Access Pipeline construction, a project which attracted strong opposition due to its potential to contaminate major drinking water sources in North Dakota
He also signed an executive order to revive the another controversial project, Keystone XL pipeline, both of which had been halted under President Obama in December after years of grassroots protest and fierce opposition from climate activists.
Trump said that both pipeline projects would be subject to renegotiation.
However, it is not only the pipelines that are in Trump's sights, he also signed a directive to end protracted environmental reviews that will allow them to build new plants.
On Wednesday, he signed an executive order to begin building a wall along US border with Mexico and crack down on US cities that shield undocumented immigrants
The directive signed by Trump was a clear sign of how determined he is when it comes to making good on his campaign promises.
The presidential campaign he ran on was based on the promise that the US will build a wall on its border with Mexico, and his executive order was the very first step towards that promise. The executive order he signed directed the Department of Homeland Security to identify and allocate all Federal funds that could be used to build the wall.
On Wednesday, he signed a second executive order making it easier for immigration agents to consider unauthorised immigrants as "criminals" — and to deport them faster
Both of Trump's executive orders on immigration on Wednesday collectively will make life more precarious for unauthorised immigrants who are already in the US and also for those who are trying to cross over.
Due to Trump's immigration policy agenda, which is aggressive and hostile toward many unauthorised immigrants within the US, both those who have crossed the border seeking asylum and those who have lived there for years, unauthorised immigrants in the US will now have a much greater threat of deportation hanging over their head.
