President-elect Donald Trump plans to begin to torpedo the Biden administration’s climate and energy policies starting on Inauguration Day.
Trump and his team are readying a series of energy-focused executive orders that the incoming president announced he plans to sign upon taking office. The moves aim to overturn some of the key policies put into place by the Biden administration and follow through on Trump’s campaign promises to slash environmental regulations and boost domestic fossil fuel production.
“I made a series of big Day One promises in my campaign,” Trump said at a December rally in Phoenix. “I intend to keep those promises to the American people.”
Trump campaigned on a dramatic reversal on energy and environmental policy, and plans to make good on those promises soon after arriving at the White House on Jan. 20, he said.
“I will sign Day One orders to end all Biden restrictions on energy production, terminate his insane electric vehicle mandate, cancel his natural gas export ban, reopen ANWR in Alaska — the biggest site, potentially anywhere in the world — and declare a national energy emergency,” Trump said in Phoenix.
Trump has also promised to direct every Cabinet secretary to cut 10 old regulations for every new regulation, to order federal workers back into the office in person or be “terminated immediately,” and launch a government downsizing operation called the Department of Government Efficiency.
Here’s what Trump has said he’ll do soon after taking office:
‘End all Biden restrictions on energy production’
Trump could reprise one of his first term executive moves on energy production.
On March 28, 2017, he signed an executive order aimed at boosting energy production and “avoiding regulatory burdens.”
That order directed agencies to scrutinize their regulations and to scrap any that “unduly burden the development of domestic energy resources” beyond what’s necessary to protect the public interest or comply with the law.
That order also revoked a series of Obama-era executive orders on climate and directed agencies to reconsider climate regulations that President Barack Obama’s team had finalized.
Trump signed that order at EPA headquarters, flanked by his first wave of energy and environmental aides and then-Vice President Mike Pence. “Together, we are going to start a new energy revolution, one that celebrates American production on American soil,” Trump told attendees at the event at the William Jefferson Clinton Building in Washington.
Biden trashed Trump’s order on his first day in office, but Trump will soon have the opportunity to turn the tables and direct agencies to ditch or review Biden’s energy and climate policies.
Terminate Biden’s ‘insane electric vehicle mandate’
Trump and his allies have regularly railed against the Biden team’s policies that promote electric vehicles.
Although there’s no Biden “mandate” to force the purchase of electric vehicles, his administration’s policies do aim to spur a broad shift from gas-powered vehicles to electric cars.
Presidents don’t have the power to wipe out federal regulations through executive orders, but Trump is almost certain to include Biden’s greenhouse gas rules for cars among the policies he directs his team to reconsider.
Trump’s moves to redo federal rules won’t be as fast as he’d like. The process of revising regulations is time consuming, and his team is certain to face challenges in court.
‘Cancel his natural gas export ban’
Trump has made it clear that he’s no fan of the Biden team’s freeze on new liquefied natural gas permits and has signaled he’ll quickly reverse course.
The Biden administration paused pending approvals of LNG export projects in January 2024 to analyze their impacts.
The Biden administration’s Energy Department released its long-anticipated study in December, finding that “unfettered” shipments of the fuel would make domestic prices rise.
Reopen ANWR in Alaska
Drilling in Alaska’s Arctic National Wildlife Refuge was one of Trump’s top energy talking points on the campaign trail.
Republicans opened the area to drilling during Trump’s first term and his administration finalized the first ever oil and gas leasing program in the wildlife refuge. But the first ever auction for drilling rights generated little interest from industry and the Biden administration froze oil exploration in ANWR.
Still, Congress mandated at least two auctions in the refuge when it inked the leasing program in 2017, and the Biden administration is now preparing to hold its own lease sale in the refuge in January, before Trump takes office.
Declare a national energy emergency
Trump said during the campaign that he would “declare a national emergency to allow us to dramatically increase energy production, generation and supply.”
Trump didn’t specify how he plans to use emergency powers to boost energy production, but an emergency declaration would give the president some additional powers.
Trump could potentially use emergency powers to restrict crude oil exports or to suspend Clean Air Act requirements, according to a guide compiled by the Brennan Center for Justice. Then-President Jimmy Carter agreed to suspend Clean Air Act requirements in some regions of the country in the 1970s, citing continuing energy supply problems.
Cut 10 regulations for every new one
Trump has promised a big expansion of his first-term pledge to cut two regulations for every new one put on the books. In his second term, he wants to ax 10 rules for every new one.
But tossing out existing regulations takes time, and the administration will face procedural and legal hurdles as it tries to erase rules that are on the books. How far they’ll get in cracking down on regulations will also depend on the scope of the rules they try to scrap or replace; some regulations are more significant than others.
Order federal workers into the office
“If people don’t come back to work, come back into the office, they’re going to be dismissed,” Trump said in December, rattling federal workers who are on edge about their job security.
As some federal employee unions race to lock in union deals extending telework agreements, Trump signaled that he plans to challenge at least one agreement approved by the Biden administration that would extend telework for federal employees beyond Trump’s term.
Although union contracts are legally binding agreements, experts say protracted legal battles could cause uncertainty for the workers they cover.
Launch the Department of Government Efficiency
Trump has promised to put Elon Musk and Vivek Ramaswamy in charge of a sweeping project to reduce the size of government.
“It will become, potentially, ‘The Manhattan Project’ of our time,” Trump said when he announced the operation. The group’s leaders will provide advice and guidance from outside of the government, Trump said, and will partner with the White House and the Office of Management and Budget to “drive large scale structural reform.”
The incoming administration has announced some additional hires for the effort but still hasn’t laid out details about its structure or about what authority it will have to reshape the government. Trump’s allies expect additional details to come after Inauguration Day.
Reporter Heather Richards contributed.
