, administered by Chief Justice
John Roberts, on January 20, 2017 Trump
was inaugurated on January 20, 2017. The day after his inauguration, an estimated 2.6 million people worldwide, including 500,000 in Washington, D.C., protested against him in the
Women's Marches. During his first two weeks in office, Trump signed
eighteen executive orders, including authorizing procedures for repealing the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act ("Obamacare"), withdrawal from the Trans-Pacific Partnership negotiations, advancement of the
Keystone XL and
Dakota Access Pipeline projects, and planning for a wall along the U.S. border with Mexico.
Conflicts of interest Trump continued to profit from his businesses during his first presidency and knew how his administration's policies affected them. Although he said he would eschew "new foreign deals", the Trump Organization pursued operational expansions in Scotland, Dubai, and the Dominican Republic.
Domestic policy Trump took office at the height of the longest
economic expansion in American history, which began in 2009 and continued until February 2020, when the
COVID-19 recession began. In December 2017, he signed the
Tax Cuts and Jobs Act of 2017, which reduced tax rates for businesses and individuals and eliminated the penalty associated with the
Affordable Care Act's individual mandate. Under Trump, the federal budget deficit increased by almost 50 percent, to nearly $1 trillion in 2019. By the end of his term, the
U.S. national debt increased by 39 percent, reaching $27.75 trillion, and the U.S.
debt-to-GDP ratio hit a post-World War II high. Trump rejects the
scientific consensus on climate change. He reduced the budget for
renewable energy research by 40 percent and reversed Obama-era policies directed at curbing
climate change. He
withdrew from the Paris Agreement, making the U.S. the only nation to not ratify it. Trump aimed and aims to boost the production and exports of
fossil fuels.
Natural gas expanded under Trump, but
coal continued to decline. He
rolled back more than 100 federal environmental regulations, including those that curbed
greenhouse gas emissions, air and
water pollution, and the use of toxic substances. He weakened protections for animals and
environmental standards for federal infrastructure projects, and expanded permitted areas for drilling and
resource extraction, such as allowing
drilling in the Arctic Refuge. Trump dismantled federal regulations on health, labor, During his first six weeks in office, he delayed, suspended, or reversed ninety federal regulations, often "after requests by the regulated industries". Trump vowed to repeal and replace the
Affordable Care Act. He scaled back the act's implementation through executive orders. He expressed a desire to "let Obamacare fail"; his administration halved the
enrollment period and drastically reduced funding for enrollment promotion. In response to the
opioid epidemic, Trump signed legislation in 2018 to increase funding for drug treatments, but was widely criticized for failing to make a concrete strategy. He barred organizations that provide abortions or abortion referrals from receiving federal funds. His administration rolled back key components of the Obama administration's workplace protections against
discrimination of LGBTQ people. His attempted rollback of anti-discrimination protections for
transgender patients in August 2020 was halted by a federal judge after a Supreme Court ruling extended employees' civil rights protections to
gender identity and sexual orientation. His administration
took an anti-marijuana position, revoking
Obama-era policies that provided protections for states that legalized marijuana. Trump is a long-time advocate of capital punishment, and his administration oversaw the
federal government execute 13 prisoners, more than in the previous 56 years combined, ending a 17-year moratorium.
Pardons and commutations During his first term, Trump granted 237 requests for clemency, fewer than all presidents since 1900 with the exception of
George H. W. Bush and
George W. Bush. Only 25 of them had been vetted by the Justice Department's
Office of the Pardon Attorney; the others were granted to people with personal or political connections to him, his family, and his allies, or recommended by celebrities. In his last full day in office, he granted 73 pardons and commuted 70 sentences. The pardons of three military service members convicted of or charged with violent crimes were opposed by military leaders.
Immigration As president, Trump described illegal immigration as an "invasion" of the United States and drastically escalated immigration enforcement. He implemented harsh policies against asylum seekers and
deployed nearly 6,000 troops to the
U.S.–Mexico border to stop illegal crossings. He reduced the number of
refugees admitted to record lows, from an annual limit of 110,000 before he took office to 15,000 in 2021. Trump also increased restrictions on granting
permanent residency to
immigrants needing public benefits. One of his central campaign promises was to build a
wall along the U.S.–Mexico border; during his first term, the U.S. built of wall in areas without barriers and to replace older barriers. In 2018, Trump's refusal to sign any
spending bill unless it allocated funding for the border wall resulted in
the longest-ever federal government shutdown, for 35 days from December 2018 to January 2019. The shutdown ended after he agreed to fund the government without any funds for the wall. Trump later declared a
national emergency on the southern border to divert $6.1 billion of funding to the border wall In January 2017, Trump signed
an executive order that
denied entry to citizens from six Muslim-majority countries for four months and from Syria indefinitely. The order caused
many protests and
legal challenges that resulted in
nationwide injunctions.
A revised order giving some exceptions was also blocked by courts, but
the Supreme Court ruled in June that the ban could be enforced on those lacking "a
bona fide relationship with a person or entity" in the U.S. Trump replaced the ban in September with
a presidential proclamation extending travel bans to North Koreans, Chadians, and some Venezuelan officials, but excluded Iraq and Sudan. The Supreme Court allowed that version to go into effect in December 2017, and ultimately upheld the ban in 2019. , June 2018 From 2017 to 2018, the Trump administration had
a policy of family separation that separated over 4,400 children, some as young as four months old, from migrant parents at the U.S.–Mexico border. The unprecedented policy sparked public outrage in the country. Despite Trump initially blaming Democrats and insisting he could not stop the policy with an executive order, he acceded to public pressure in June 2018 and mandated that illegal immigrant families be detained together unless "there is a concern" of risk for the child. A judge later ordered that the families be reunited and further separations stopped except in limited circumstances, though over 1,000 additional children were separated from their families after the order. and his foreign policy as "
America First". He supported
populist,
neo-nationalist, and authoritarian governments. Unpredictability, uncertainty, and inconsistency characterized foreign relations during his tenure. He criticized
NATO allies and privately suggested that the U.S. should
withdraw from NATO. Trump supported many of the policies of Israeli prime minister
Benjamin Netanyahu. In 2020, Trump hosted the signing of the
Abraham Accords between Israel and the
United Arab Emirates and
Bahrain to normalize their foreign relations. in
Helsinki, Finland Trump began
a trade war with China in 2018 after imposing tariffs and other trade barriers he said would force China to end longstanding unfair trade practice and
intellectual property infringement. Trump weakened the toughest U.S. sanctions imposed after the
2014 Russian annexation of Crimea. Trump praised and, according to some critics, rarely criticized Russian president
Vladimir Putin, though he opposed some actions of Russia's government. He withdrew the U.S. from the
Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces Treaty, citing alleged Russian noncompliance, and supported Russia's possible return to the
G7. As
North Korea's nuclear weapons were increasingly seen as a serious threat, Trump became the first sitting U.S. president to meet a North Korean leader, meeting
Kim Jong Un three times between June 2018 and June 2019. Talks on North Korean
denuclearization broke down in October 2019, and no agreement was reached.
Personnel By the end of Trump's first year in office, 34 percent of his original staff had resigned, been fired, or been reassigned. By July 2018, 61 percent of his senior aides had left and 141 staffers had left in the previous year. Both figures set a record for recent presidents. Various close personal aides to Trump stopped working for him or were forced to leave. Trump publicly disparaged several of his former top officials. Trump had four
White House chiefs of staff, marginalizing or pushing out several. In May 2017, he
dismissed Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) director James Comey, saying a few days later that he was concerned about Comey's role in the Trump–Russia investigations. Three of Trump's 15 original cabinet members left or were forced to resign within his first year. By January 8, 2019, of 706 key positions, 433 had been filled and he had no nominee for 264.
Judiciary Trump appointed 234
federal judges, including 54 to the
courts of appeals and
three to the
Supreme Court:
Neil Gorsuch,
Brett Kavanaugh, and
Amy Coney Barrett, which politically shifted the Court to the right. In the 2016 campaign, he pledged that
Roe v. Wade would be overturned "automatically" if he were elected and given the opportunity to appoint two or three anti-abortion justices. He later took credit when
Roe was overturned by ''
Dobbs v. Jackson Women's Health Organization'' in 2022; all three of his Supreme Court nominees voted with the majority. Trump disparaged courts and judges he disagreed with, often in personal terms, and questioned the judiciary's constitutional authority. His attacks on courts drew rebukes from observers, including sitting federal judges, concerned about the effect of his statements on the
judicial independence and public confidence in the judiciary.
COVID-19 pandemic on March 15, 2020|alt=Trump speaks in the West Wing briefing room with various officials standing behind him, all in formal attire and without face masks After ignoring public health warnings and calls for action from health officials within his administration for weeks, Trump established the
White House Coronavirus Task Force in late January. In March, he signed into law the
CARES Act—a $2.2 trillion bipartisan
economic stimulus bill—the largest stimulus in U.S. history. After weeks of attacks to draw attention away from his slow response, Trump halted funding of the
World Health Organization in April. He encouraged right-wing
protests against social-distancing policies in states with stay-at-home orders and repeatedly pressured federal health agencies to take actions he favored, such as approving unproven treatments. In October, Trump was
hospitalized for three days with a severe case of
COVID-19 while his medical team downplayed the severity of his condition.
Investigations After he assumed office, Trump was the subject of increasing
Justice Department and congressional scrutiny, with investigations covering his election campaign, transition, and inauguration, actions taken during his presidency,
his private businesses, personal taxes, and
his charitable foundation. There were ten federal criminal investigations, eight state and local investigations, and twelve congressional investigations. In July 2016, the
FBI launched
Crossfire Hurricane, an investigation into possible links between Russia and Trump's 2016 campaign. After Trump fired Comey in May 2017, the FBI opened a second investigation into Trump's personal and
business dealings with Russia. In January 2017, three U.S. intelligence agencies jointly stated with "high confidence" that
Russia interfered in the 2016 presidential election to favor Trump. Crossfire Hurricane was later transferred to
Robert Mueller's
special counsel investigation; the investigation into Trump's ties to Russia was ended by Deputy Attorney General
Rod Rosenstein after he told the FBI that Mueller would pursue the matter. At the request of Rosenstein, the Mueller investigation examined criminal matters "in connection with Russia's 2016 election interference". found that Russia interfered in 2016 to favor Trump and that Trump and his campaign welcomed and encouraged the effort, but that the evidence "did not establish" that Trump campaign members conspired or coordinated with Russia. Trump claimed the report exonerated him despite Mueller writing that it did not. The report also detailed potential obstruction of justice by Trump but "did not draw ultimate conclusions" and left the decision to charge the laws to Congress.
Impeachments Trump was
impeached twice by the House of Representatives, though acquitted by the Senate on both occasions. The
first impeachment arose from a whistleblower complaint that in July 2019 Trump
had pressured Ukrainian president
Volodymyr Zelenskyy to investigate Joe and Hunter Biden, in an attempt to gain an advantage in the
2020 presidential election. In December 2019, the House voted to impeach Trump for
abuse of power and
obstruction of Congress, and the Senate acquitted him in February 2020. The
second impeachment came after the January 6 Capitol attack, for which the House charged Trump with
incitement of insurrection on January 13, 2021. Trump left office on January 20, and was acquitted on February 13. Seven Republican senators voted for conviction.
2020 presidential election and rejection of outcome Trump filed to run for reelection only a few hours after becoming president in 2017. He held his first reelection rally less than a month after taking office and officially became the
Republican nominee in August 2020. Trump's campaign focused on crime, claiming that cities would descend into lawlessness if Democratic nominee
Joe Biden won. Starting in early 2020, Trump sowed doubts about the election, claiming without evidence that it would be rigged and that widespread use of mail balloting would produce massive election fraud. He repeatedly refused to say whether he would accept the results if he lost and commit to a
peaceful transition of power. Joe Biden won the November 2020 election, receiving 81.3 million votes (51.3 percent) to Trump's 74.2 million (46.8 percent) and 306 electoral votes to Trump's 232, with the
Electoral College formalizing Biden's victory on December 14. Days later, when Biden was projected the winner, Trump baselessly alleged election fraud. As part of
an effort to overturn the results, Trump and his allies filed many
lawsuits challenging the results, which were rejected by at least 86 judges in both state and federal courts for having no factual or legal basis. Trump's allegations were also refuted by state election officials, and the Supreme Court declined to hear
a case asking it to overturn the results in four states won by Biden. Trump repeatedly sought help to overturn the results, personally pressuring Republican local and state office-holders, Republican legislators, the Justice Department, and Vice President Pence, urging actions such as
replacing presidential electors,
January 6 attack On January 6, 2021, while
Congress was certifying the presidential election results,
Trump held a rally at which he called for the election to be overturned and urged his supporters to "fight like hell" and "take back our country" by marching to the Capitol. His supporters then formed a mob that broke into the building, disrupting certification and causing the evacuation of Congress. More than 140 police officers were injured, and five people died during or after the attack. The event has been described as an attempted
self-coup by Trump. Congress later reconvened and confirmed Biden's victory in the early hours of January 7. == Between presidencies (2021–2025) ==