By Stella Lorence
Boston University News Service
Following recent mass-shooting events, such as those in Atlanta, Georgia and Boulder, Colorado, President Joe Biden announced a slate of executive actions relating to gun control this month.
“This Administration will not wait for Congress to act to take its own steps — fully within the Administration’s authority and the Second Amendment — to save lives,” the White House said in a statement.
Presidents using executive orders to circumvent Congress is not new, nor is criticism of the technique, but Biden has quadrupled his predecessors when it comes to issuing executive orders during the first months of an administration.
Biden has issued 38 executive orders in just under four months, compared to Donald Trump’s 26 and Barack Obama’s 19 in roughly the same time period, according to data kept by the Federal Register.
Many of these early executive orders — nine of which were signed on Inauguration Day — were directives to undo those of the Trump administration, such as reinstating stricter emissions and pollution standards and revoking harsher immigration enforcement orders.
Seven of Biden’s executive orders so far have been directives relating to either COVID-19 or public health, all of which were signed within the first three days of his presidency.
Peaks in the issuing of executive orders near the beginning of a president’s term have occurred routinely since at least 1994. After Biden, the second-highest peak was George W. Bush’s first month in office in 2001, with 16 orders.
Republicans were critical of Obama’s use of executive actions, claiming he was overstepping his authority. Data shows, however, that the number of executive orders Obama issued stayed relatively consistent after the first few months of his term — even after his party eventually lost their majorities in both houses of Congress after the 2010 midterm elections.
Both Trump and Obama increased the use of executive orders near the end of their terms, with Trump signing three on his last day in office alone. One of these midnight orders was a revocation of an earlier executive order. The order banned appointees to executive agencies from becoming lobbyists to that agency for at least five years.
Executive orders are directives the President issues to manage operations of the Executive branch. Presidents can also influence policy by issuing other documents, such as memos, notices and orders, all of which are also recorded in the Federal Registry.
Contrary to popular belief, the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals, an Obama-era initiative that protected the children of immigrants brought to the U.S. as children from deportation, was not created by executive order.
It was a memo issued by the former Department of Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano in 2012. One of Biden’s first actions as president on Inauguration Day was to issue another memo directing the Department of Homeland Security to comply with provisions originally outlined in that document nine years ago.
Biden has already issued 20 of these “other presidential documents,” falling just below the roughly six-per-month average of Trump and Obama.
