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Give Me a Crash Course In . . . Donald Trump’s first week

Mexico, immigrants, Obamacare, the environment, ‘alternative facts’, voting, abortion: it’s been a fight a day for the new US president

US president Donald Trump on Air Force One. Photograph: Pablo Martinez Monsivais/AP Photo

Simon Carswell's face
Simon Carswell In Washington
Sat Jan 28 2017 - 00:00

So what did the Donald get up to in his first week as the 45th president of the United States?

Quite a bit, actually. The Republican spent his first days in the White House making good on many campaign promises through a blizzard of executive orders. These presidential directions, which do not require congressional approval, are mostly symbolic: rather than lead to immediate changes they signpost Trump’s intentions for his four years in office.

What’s the biggest thing he did all week?

On Wednesday he signed two orders to build a wall on the United States’ border with Mexico, aimed at keeping drugs, gangs and illegal immigrants out, and to step up the deportation of illegal immigrants who have committed crimes in the US.

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How did that go down?

When Trump said he planned to seek payment for the wall – Republicans say it will cost between €11 billion and €14 billion – from Mexico, President Enrique Peña Nieto said no way. A Twitter spat, conducted partly from Air Force One, escalated into a full-blown diplomatic incident, the first of Trump’s presidency, as the Mexican leader called off a meeting at the White House next Tuesday. The administration escalated matters further on Thursday when it floated the idea of recouping the cost of the wall through a 20 per cent tax on Mexican imports.

What else did Trump do?

One of his first acts was to sign an order rolling back Obamacare, aka the Affordable Care Act, which Barack Obama introduced to give millions of uninsured Americans access to health coverage. There were other measures to cut regulations, fast-track environmental reviews and freeze the hiring of federal employees. Fulfilling his election pledges to the blue-collar workers who supported him in such large numbers, he withdrew the US from talks on the Trans-Pacific Partnership trade agreement and announced plans to renegotiate the North American Free Trade Agreement. He has called both a disaster. He also reinstated an order that now bans federal money going to any NGOs that “perform or actively promote abortion as a method of family planning in other nations” and cleared the way for the Dakota Access and Keystone oil pipelines, both cancelled during the Obama administration.

Did he get into any other fights this week?

Of course. He’s Donald Trump. As his fragile ego was wounded by the number of anti-Trump protesters in the Women’s March the day after his inauguration (many more than attended his inauguration), he directed his press secretary, Sean Spicer, to shout at journalists about “deliberately false reporting” in “understating” the inaugural crowd. But the crowds were smaller. Trump’s chief of staff, Reince Priebus, pledged to fight back against the media “obsession” with delegitimising the president, and his adviser Kellyanne Conway said the administration was presenting “alternative facts” and may need to rethink its relationship with the media. It later emerged that Trump even called the acting head of the National Park Service to find more photographs of the crowds at his swearing-in, in an attempt to prove the media had lied. Reports surfaced of aides trying to keep Trump from getting bored and watching TV or reading tweets.

Any other controversy?

Yep. The president resurrected his debunked claim that up to five million votes were cast illegally, costing him the popular vote in the election. He called for investigation of “voter fraud”, including of people (legally) registered to vote in two states. It turned out that his daughter Tiffany, son-in-law Jared Kushner and chief strategist, Steve Bannon, are all registered in two states.

So what should the first week of the Trump administration tell us about his presidency?

That he intends to govern as he campaigned and follow through on his most extreme promises – accompanied by lots of noise, chaos and media-bashing.