
President Donald Trump’s first week of his second term was marked by competent planning and execution. His second week was more chaotic, including blundered attempts to freeze funding and offer civil servants a buyout.
President Trump enacted his first bill, tightening immigration enforcement. The Senate finished 10 days of votes to confirm members of the Trump cabinet. House Republican leaders hope to begin work this week on a budget resolution to unlock reconciliation rules essential to enacting the President’s agenda – likely including a provision to ignore $5.5 billion in revenue losses, fostering a major sticking point.
The White House and Congress have no plans yet to prevent a March government shutdown or a summer default on Treasury bonds.
The effort to freeze government spending was withdrawn by the White House, perhaps because it’s first engagements with the courts proved it to be a poor test case for dismantling Congress’ exclusive Power of the Purse – authority written into the Constitution based on England’s restrictions on monarchical power. Although the spending freeze was scuttled, the President is eager to challenge congressional power, believing his appointees to the Supreme Court will side with him.
The civil service buyout offer is almost certainly unlawful and probably a violation of the Anti-Deficiency Act.
Immigration enforcement is the Trump Administration’s greatest success so far. Raids and deportation flights are achieving the President’s goal of instilling fear among migrants hoping to come to, or stay in, the United States.
Saturday, President Trump ordered across-the-board tariffs on goods from Canada, Mexico, and China, indicating a willingness to take on a high level of economic risk.
The Gallup Organization reports the President’s initial job approval rating is 48 percent, about the same as Presidents George H.W. Bush and Ronald Reagan, although Trump’s disapproval of 48 percent is significantly higher.