By BENJIE OLIVEROS
Bulatlat perspective
US Pres. Donald Trump is perhaps one of the first newly elected US president whose inauguration was met with mass protests. The calls “Not my president” and “Resist” reverberated across the US.
US President Trump, however, appeared to have not been bothered by the protests. He ignored it and, true to his campaign promise, immediately issued several executive orders. The following is a list of executive orders Trump has signed so far, which was lifted from a report of Fox News.
1. On border security and immigration enforcement: the authorization of a U.S.-Mexico border wall; the stripping of federal grant money to sanctuary cities; hiring 5,000 more Border Patrol agents; ending “catch-and-release” policies for illegal immigrants; and reinstating local and state immigration enforcement partnerships.
2. Revival of the Keystone XL pipeline and Dakota Access pipelines. He also signed three other related orders that would: expedite the environmental permitting process for infrastructure projects related to the pipelines; direct the Commerce Department to streamline the manufacturing permitting process; and give the Commerce Department 180 days to maximize the use of U.S. steel in the pipeline.
3. Reinstating the so-called “Mexico City Policy” – a ban on federal funds to international groups that perform abortions or lobby to legalize or promote abortion. The policy was instituted in 1984 by President Reagan, but has gone into and out of effect depending on the party in power in the White House.
4. A notice that the U.S. will begin withdrawing from the Trans-Pacific Partnership trade deal. Trump called the order “a great thing for the American worker.”
5. An order imposing a hiring freeze for some federal government workers as a way to shrink the size of government. This excludes the military, as Trump noted at the signing.
6. An order that directs federal agencies to ease the “regulatory burdens” of ObamaCare. It orders agencies to “waive, defer, grant exemptions from, or delay the implementation of any provision or requirement” of ObamaCare that imposes a “fiscal burden on any State or a cost, fee, tax, penalty, or regulatory burden on individuals, families, healthcare providers, health insurers, patients, recipients of healthcare services, purchasers of health insurance, or makers of medical devices, products, or medications.”
In addition, Trump issued a gag order on the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and the Department of Agriculture (USDA), which prohibits both agencies from issuing statements on social media and traditional media outlets.
Of course it is not unusual for US presidents to issue executive orders during their term or even during their first 100 days in office. It was done by Trump’s predecessor Barack Obama, as well as George W. Bush, Bill Clinton, among others.
What makes Trump’s executive orders significant is the controversial content of a number of his executive orders such as the authorization of the building of the border wall between the US and Mexico; the revival of the Keystone XL pipeline and the Dakota Access pipeline, which has been the subject of numerous protests because it would pollute the drinking water of an Indian reservation; and the freeze hiring for Federal agencies, as well as the gag order on the EPA and USDA.
This shows that Trump is serious in putting his xenophobic, racist, sexist, and fascistic statements into action no matter how controversial, unpopular, and stupid these were.
This also shows that Trump would not listen to reason or to massive protests. That is, unless the protest movement reaches such magnitude that it would already shake the foundations of the White House.
So to the American people and all freedom loving peoples of the world: Prepare for an intense political battle! 
