With 28 Executive Orders Signed, President Biden Is Off To A Record Start
In his first two weeks in office, President Biden has signed nearly as many executive orders as Franklin Roosevelt signed in his entire first month. And President Roosevelt holds the record.
Adding his signature to three executive orders on immigration Tuesday, Biden has now signed 28 executive orders since taking office. FDR signed 30 in his first month.
"By sheer volume, Biden is going to be the most active president on this front since the 1930s," said Andy Rudalevige, a professor of government at Bowdoin College.
Executive orders are the easiest presidential directives to track over time because they are all numbered and published in the Federal Register. But Biden is using many more levers of executive authority, also signing presidential memoranda, proclamations and letters.
Here's how Biden stacks up with other recent presidents on executive orders:
Biden's actions so far include:
- 28 executive orders
- four substantive proclamations (plus one ceremonial)
- 10 presidential memoranda
- and two letters (rejoining the World Health Organization and Paris climate agreement)
And while the numbers are large, these actions aren't barrier-breaking. They call for the creation of task forces, direct agencies to begin a regulatory process or explore a policy change.
"A lot of what these orders consist of are plans to make plans, in a sense," Rudalevige said. "There's a lot of reviewing, reporting, sort of an urging to rev up that process, but it's not a substitute for the process itself."
Executive actions can't create new laws — they have to exist within the constraints of the Constitution and existing statute. They direct the executive branch to do what is already in its power. And as a result they can be, and often are, reversed by the next president. In fact, many of Biden's actions take aim at things former President Donald Trump had done with a swipe of his Sharpie.
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