Week 1 of Biden presidency: More executive orders

[lavenderblondee PronounsShe/her]

3 hours ago, NotDoctor said:

Biggest news of this administration so far: Biden has removed Trump's Diet Coke button

 

And we still think people thought he wanted to be a president to actually help...

[MANiCURE1295 Pronounshe/him]

2nd Day - 10 Executive Signings Related to the COVID pandemic

Masks

Hours after being sworn in as the 46th president on Wednesday, Biden signed more than a dozen executive actions in the Oval Office, including one requiring masks on federal property.

The president said Thursday he will also call on governors, local health officials, mayors and business leaders to encourage mask wearing and social distancing.

Travel

Biden is also requiring masks on public transportation, including trains, buses and aircraft. International travelers will need to present a negative Covid-19 test before entering the U.S. and will have to quarantine upon arrival. The executive order also directs other agencies to expand public health measures for domestic travel and cross-border land and sea travel.

Supply Chain

Biden also directed agencies to use the Defense Production Act to compel companies to make supplies needed to combat the pandemic. That could include protective equipment like masks as well as supplies needed for Covid-19 tests and to administer vaccines. The Trump administration invoked the act last year to get U.S. manufacturers to make ventilators and other supplies.

The executive order, called "A Sustainable Public Health Supply Chain," also directs "the development of a new Pandemic Supply Chain Resilience Strategy" in an effort to bolster domestic manufacturing of critical supplies.

State and Local Support

The administration is also seeking to accelerate the rollout of vaccines by providing more funding to local and state officials, creating more vaccination sites and launching a national public education campaign. The plan says the administration will also "surge the health care workforce to support the vaccination effort," which could include waiving some licensing requirements, for example.

Biden previously announced that his administration will aim to administer 100 million vaccine shots in its first 100 days. Jeff Zients, Biden's coordinator for the Covid response, said on a conference call Wednesday evening that that's just the beginning.

Biden will direct the Federal Emergency Management Agency to set up 100 community vaccination centers in the next month as part of that effort. Similar to the Trump administration, Biden's plan will also encourage states to move quickly to expand the groups eligible to receive the vaccine.

COVID Response Office

To bolster trust in the government's response, the White House is establishing a "COVID-19 Response Office," charged with coordinating the pandemic response across federal agencies and establishing clear lines of communication down to local officials. The federal government will also conduct regular, expert-led briefings, the plan says.

Data Collection

Biden signed another executive order directing the response office and all federal agencies to improve federal data collection and sharing. It directs the CDC to publish a dashboard showing Covid-19 cases at the county level, "so that Americans can gauge the level of transmission in their own communities to make their own informed choices," the plan says.

New Treatments

Even as the vaccination effort gains speed, the plan calls for continued research into treatments for Covid, especially antivirals like Gilead's remdesivir. Through an executive order called "Improving and Expanding Access to Care and Treatment for COVID-19," Biden established a new drug discovery and development program that emphasizes diversity in clinical trials.

That order also expanded programs designed to support patients recovering from Covid-19, the plan says, and increased the health-care workforce capacity.

Testing

In addition to new drugs, Biden's plan also places a renewed emphasis on more testing. The president established a new pandemic testing board to discover new kinds of effective and rapid tests and scale them up quickly.

The federal government will also provide guidance to schools, businesses and other congregate settings on how to best use widespread testing to slow the spread of the virus and cut off chains of transmission, according to the plan.

Reopening Schools & Businesses

Safely reopening schools and businesses is a key component of the plan. Biden signed an order on Thursday that directs the Department of Health and Human Services to collect data on school reopenings and the spread of Covid, allowing for more scientific research into the risk of putting kids back in schools.

The new plan also calls on the Occupational Safety and Health Administration to take on a larger role, setting clear guidance to employers on safe workplace practices and enforcement.

Equity

And Biden, through another order, also established a "COVID-19 Health Equity Task Force" to ensure vaccines, treatments, masks and other resources reach everyone, including harder hit communities of color that have suffered from disproportionately high death rates in the U.S.

Also, the administration proposed a $1.9 trillion coronavirus rescue package last week. The proposal, called the American Rescue Plan, includes $350 billion in state and local government aid, $170 billion for K-12 schools and institutions of higher education, $50 billion toward Covid testing and $20 billion toward a national vaccine program.

Edited January 21, 2021 by MANiCURE1295

[BenG]

The essays. Chile

[BenG]

Jk @MANiCURE1295. Loving the updates.

[MANiCURE1295 Pronounshe/him]

2 minutes ago, ... said:

Jk @MANiCURE1295. Loving the updates.

Thank you, I really hope it doesn’t bother anyone too much, I know they are long!
 

I will say It’s nice to see a President that actually is putting some effort into defeating this pandemic! 
 

plus, Queen Aspen slay me 

[BenG]

1 minute ago, MANiCURE1295 said:

Thank you, I really hope it doesn’t bother anyone too much, I know they are long!
 

I will say It’s nice to see a President that actually is putting some effort into defeating this pandemic! 
 

plus, Queen Aspen slay me 

It’s a good length as bite-size info. 
 

Your dog is just so damn adorable.

[SLAG PronounsHe/Him]

22 hours ago, MANiCURE1295 said:

Details of 17 Executive Orders Signed by Biden on First Day in Office:

COVID-19 response 

1) Start a "100 Days Masking Challenge," calling for a nationwide face mask and social distancing mandate in federal buildings, on federal lands and by federal employees and contractors. 

2) Restructure federal government coordination to the COVID-19 pandemic. The Biden White House is bringing back an Obama-era position called the "Directorate for Global Health Security and Biodefense," which was organized with additional staff within the National Security Council after the 2014 Ebola epidemic. This directorate office was dispersed into other roles during the Trump administration, but Biden and his campaign advisers argued the move decreased the preparedness of the federal government for the COVID-19 pandemic. Biden will also formally implement a "response coordinator" who will report to the president on vaccine, testing and personal protective equipment production, supply, and distribution. Biden has appointed Jeff Zients, who has been overseeing Biden's COVID-19 team for the presidential transition.  

3) Rejoin the World Health Organization (WHO), which the Trump administration was in the process of leaving. Biden is also looking to reestablish the U.S. as an active leader at the WHO. 
 

Financial relief for Americans

4) Extend eviction and foreclosure moratoriums. Biden will call on the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention to re-implement and extend the already defunct moratorium until at least March 31. The new president will also call on the Departments of Agriculture, Housing and Urban Development, and Veterans Affairs to extend the foreclosure moratoriums for their federally backed mortgages. "These emergency measures are important," Mr. Biden's top economic adviser Brian Deese said on the call with reporters, "There are more than 11 million mortgages guaranteed by the VA, Department of Agriculture and HUD that would be extended."   
 

5) Continue "pause" on student loan payments until September 30. The Biden advisers continue to assert Biden still supports his campaign pledge to cancel $10,000 of student loans, but this will take time as it has to go through Congress.  
 

Environment 

6) Rejoin the Paris Climate Agreement. The Paris climate negotiations took place under the Obama administration and were led by incoming climate change czar John Kerry when he was  secretary of state. This will take 30 days to go into effect.  

7) End Keystone XL pipeline and revoke oil and gas development at national wildlife monuments. To do this, Biden's climate adviser Gina McCarthy explained the Biden administration will discard or redo more than 100 "harmful" presidential proclamations, memoranda or permits signed by the Trump administration that the new administration views as detrimental to the environment. Other changes include directing agencies to "consider revising vehicle fuel economic and emissions standards" and placing federal working groups to deal with greenhouse gases, according to an outline of the executive orders.

Human rights 

8) Actions to advance racial equity through the federal government. Incoming Domestic Policy Adviser Susan Rice explained President Biden wants every federal agency to review equity in their programs and actions. For example, with this executive action the Office of Management and Budget will analyze if federal money is equitably distributed in communities of color and other places of need, the outline of the executive action said. Rice also said Trump's "harmful" 1776 Commission, the 18-member board he formulated in September, will be stopped. The commission's goal was to study the president's concern that the American education system was taking a too liberal approach to American history.  
 

9) Count non-citizens in U.S. Census again.  This reverses President Trump's order in July 2020 to not count undocumented Americans, which would affect federal allocation of money and federal representation. 

10) Strengthen workplace discrimination protections based on sexual orientation and gender identity. At agencies, this broadens the federal protections against sex discrimination to include LGBTQ Americans.

Immigration 

11) Defend "Dreamers" program for undocumented young Americans. In this executive order, calls on Congress to grant permanent status and a path to citizenship to Dreamers — almost a million undocumented young people who were brought to the country as children and shielded from deportation by President Obama. The Trump administration challenged the law but the Supreme Court upheld it. 

12) End so-called "Muslim travel ban”, which in 2017 restricted travel and immigration to the U.S. from Syria, Iran, Iraq, Sudan, Libya, Somalia and Yemen, before adding Eritrea, Nigeria, Myanmar, Kyrgyzstan, and Tanzania in 2020. The State Department is also instructed to restart visa applications for these countries.  
 

13) Change Trump's arrest priorities for Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE). This executive order will repeal the changes Mr. Trump made in the first week of his presidency in 2017 to make interior immigration enforcement much stricter. Few specifics were listed in the outline of the executive order, but the incoming Biden White House team stated the Department of Homeland Security, in partnership with other agencies, will "set civil immigration enforcement policies that best protect the American people and are in line with our values and priorities." 

14) Stop border wall construction. Biden will end the national emergency declaration cited by the Trump administration to divert money to the building of the southern wall.  

15) Keep protections for a group of Liberians in the country. Liberians who have been in the United States for many years will be able to remain longer. Their "deferred enforcement departure" will be extended an additional year, until June 30, 2022. President Trump briefly considered ending this deferment before ultimately extending the program.

Regulation 

16) Freezing last-minute Trump administration regulatory actions. Technically, White House chief of staff Ron Klain will be charged with carrying out this out, and a presidential memo will formally state the regulations to be frozen. 

Ethics 

17) Formulate Executive Branch ethics doctrine. Biden wants every executive branch appointee to sign an ethics pledge. The pledge also demands federal employees promise "to uphold the independence of the Department of Justice," the executive order outline states. 
 

I WORKED SO HARD ON THIS I HOPE YALL LOVE IT 

Thanks for taking the time to make it! Much appreciation! 

[MANiCURE1295 Pronounshe/him]

43 minutes ago, ... said:

It’s a good length as bite-size info. 
 

Your dog is just so damn adorable.

Well she just sh!t on floor literally....so she’s adorable... but damn girl @

she is having some stomach issues so wish Aspen the best giving her sick chicken and rice right now to help her stomach.

OT: YAS BIDEN YAS KAMALA YAS MAJORITY LEADER SCHUMER

[lavenderblondee PronounsShe/her]

@MANiCURE1295 It is VERY appreciated. Thank you for laying it out simply! 

[MANiCURE1295 Pronounshe/him]

1 hour ago, SLAG said:

Thanks for taking the time to make it! Much appreciation! 

 

9 minutes ago, lavenderblondee said:

@MANiCURE1295 It is VERY appreciated. Thank you for laying it out simply! 

Thank you guys, ill keep it up as long as he keeps signing them in bulk! :) glad people are finding them helpful and enjoying them.

[MANiCURE1295 Pronounshe/him]

On 1/20/2021 at 8:10 PM, MANiCURE1295 said:

Details of 17 Executive Orders Signed by Biden on First Day in Office:

COVID-19 response 

1) Start a "100 Days Masking Challenge," calling for a nationwide face mask and social distancing mandate in federal buildings, on federal lands and by federal employees and contractors. 

2) Restructure federal government coordination to the COVID-19 pandemic. The Biden White House is bringing back an Obama-era position called the "Directorate for Global Health Security and Biodefense," which was organized with additional staff within the National Security Council after the 2014 Ebola epidemic. This directorate office was dispersed into other roles during the Trump administration, but Biden and his campaign advisers argued the move decreased the preparedness of the federal government for the COVID-19 pandemic. Biden will also formally implement a "response coordinator" who will report to the president on vaccine, testing and personal protective equipment production, supply, and distribution. Biden has appointed Jeff Zients, who has been overseeing Biden's COVID-19 team for the presidential transition.  

3) Rejoin the World Health Organization (WHO), which the Trump administration was in the process of leaving. Biden is also looking to reestablish the U.S. as an active leader at the WHO. 
 

Financial relief for Americans

4) Extend eviction and foreclosure moratoriums. Biden will call on the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention to re-implement and extend the already defunct moratorium until at least March 31. The new president will also call on the Departments of Agriculture, Housing and Urban Development, and Veterans Affairs to extend the foreclosure moratoriums for their federally backed mortgages. "These emergency measures are important," Mr. Biden's top economic adviser Brian Deese said on the call with reporters, "There are more than 11 million mortgages guaranteed by the VA, Department of Agriculture and HUD that would be extended."   
 

5) Continue "pause" on student loan payments until September 30. The Biden advisers continue to assert Biden still supports his campaign pledge to cancel $10,000 of student loans, but this will take time as it has to go through Congress.  
 

Environment 

6) Rejoin the Paris Climate Agreement. The Paris climate negotiations took place under the Obama administration and were led by incoming climate change czar John Kerry when he was  secretary of state. This will take 30 days to go into effect.  

7) End Keystone XL pipeline and revoke oil and gas development at national wildlife monuments. To do this, Biden's climate adviser Gina McCarthy explained the Biden administration will discard or redo more than 100 "harmful" presidential proclamations, memoranda or permits signed by the Trump administration that the new administration views as detrimental to the environment. Other changes include directing agencies to "consider revising vehicle fuel economic and emissions standards" and placing federal working groups to deal with greenhouse gases, according to an outline of the executive orders.

Human rights 

8) Actions to advance racial equity through the federal government. Incoming Domestic Policy Adviser Susan Rice explained President Biden wants every federal agency to review equity in their programs and actions. For example, with this executive action the Office of Management and Budget will analyze if federal money is equitably distributed in communities of color and other places of need, the outline of the executive action said. Rice also said Trump's "harmful" 1776 Commission, the 18-member board he formulated in September, will be stopped. The commission's goal was to study the president's concern that the American education system was taking a too liberal approach to American history.  
 

9) Count non-citizens in U.S. Census again.  This reverses President Trump's order in July 2020 to not count undocumented Americans, which would affect federal allocation of money and federal representation. 

10) Strengthen workplace discrimination protections based on sexual orientation and gender identity. At agencies, this broadens the federal protections against sex discrimination to include LGBTQ Americans.

Immigration 

11) Defend "Dreamers" program for undocumented young Americans. In this executive order, calls on Congress to grant permanent status and a path to citizenship to Dreamers — almost a million undocumented young people who were brought to the country as children and shielded from deportation by President Obama. The Trump administration challenged the law but the Supreme Court upheld it. 

12) End so-called "Muslim travel ban”, which in 2017 restricted travel and immigration to the U.S. from Syria, Iran, Iraq, Sudan, Libya, Somalia and Yemen, before adding Eritrea, Nigeria, Myanmar, Kyrgyzstan, and Tanzania in 2020. The State Department is also instructed to restart visa applications for these countries.  
 

13) Change Trump's arrest priorities for Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE). This executive order will repeal the changes Mr. Trump made in the first week of his presidency in 2017 to make interior immigration enforcement much stricter. Few specifics were listed in the outline of the executive order, but the incoming Biden White House team stated the Department of Homeland Security, in partnership with other agencies, will "set civil immigration enforcement policies that best protect the American people and are in line with our values and priorities." 

14) Stop border wall construction. Biden will end the national emergency declaration cited by the Trump administration to divert money to the building of the southern wall.  

15) Keep protections for a group of Liberians in the country. Liberians who have been in the United States for many years will be able to remain longer. Their "deferred enforcement departure" will be extended an additional year, until June 30, 2022. President Trump briefly considered ending this deferment before ultimately extending the program.

Regulation 

16) Freezing last-minute Trump administration regulatory actions. Technically, White House chief of staff Ron Klain will be charged with carrying out this out, and a presidential memo will formally state the regulations to be frozen. 

Ethics 

17) Formulate Executive Branch ethics doctrine. Biden wants every executive branch appointee to sign an ethics pledge. The pledge also demands federal employees promise "to uphold the independence of the Department of Justice," the executive order outline states. 
 

I WORKED SO HARD ON THIS I HOPE YALL LOVE IT 

 

19 hours ago, MANiCURE1295 said:

2nd Day - 10 Executive Signings Related to the COVID pandemic

Masks

Hours after being sworn in as the 46th president on Wednesday, Biden signed more than a dozen executive actions in the Oval Office, including one requiring masks on federal property.

The president said Thursday he will also call on governors, local health officials, mayors and business leaders to encourage mask wearing and social distancing.

Travel

Biden is also requiring masks on public transportation, including trains, buses and aircraft. International travelers will need to present a negative Covid-19 test before entering the U.S. and will have to quarantine upon arrival. The executive order also directs other agencies to expand public health measures for domestic travel and cross-border land and sea travel.

Supply Chain

Biden also directed agencies to use the Defense Production Act to compel companies to make supplies needed to combat the pandemic. That could include protective equipment like masks as well as supplies needed for Covid-19 tests and to administer vaccines. The Trump administration invoked the act last year to get U.S. manufacturers to make ventilators and other supplies.

The executive order, called "A Sustainable Public Health Supply Chain," also directs "the development of a new Pandemic Supply Chain Resilience Strategy" in an effort to bolster domestic manufacturing of critical supplies.

State and Local Support

The administration is also seeking to accelerate the rollout of vaccines by providing more funding to local and state officials, creating more vaccination sites and launching a national public education campaign. The plan says the administration will also "surge the health care workforce to support the vaccination effort," which could include waiving some licensing requirements, for example.

Biden previously announced that his administration will aim to administer 100 million vaccine shots in its first 100 days. Jeff Zients, Biden's coordinator for the Covid response, said on a conference call Wednesday evening that that's just the beginning.

Biden will direct the Federal Emergency Management Agency to set up 100 community vaccination centers in the next month as part of that effort. Similar to the Trump administration, Biden's plan will also encourage states to move quickly to expand the groups eligible to receive the vaccine.

COVID Response Office

To bolster trust in the government's response, the White House is establishing a "COVID-19 Response Office," charged with coordinating the pandemic response across federal agencies and establishing clear lines of communication down to local officials. The federal government will also conduct regular, expert-led briefings, the plan says.

Data Collection

Biden signed another executive order directing the response office and all federal agencies to improve federal data collection and sharing. It directs the CDC to publish a dashboard showing Covid-19 cases at the county level, "so that Americans can gauge the level of transmission in their own communities to make their own informed choices," the plan says.

New Treatments

Even as the vaccination effort gains speed, the plan calls for continued research into treatments for Covid, especially antivirals like Gilead's remdesivir. Through an executive order called "Improving and Expanding Access to Care and Treatment for COVID-19," Biden established a new drug discovery and development program that emphasizes diversity in clinical trials.

That order also expanded programs designed to support patients recovering from Covid-19, the plan says, and increased the health-care workforce capacity.

Testing

In addition to new drugs, Biden's plan also places a renewed emphasis on more testing. The president established a new pandemic testing board to discover new kinds of effective and rapid tests and scale them up quickly.

The federal government will also provide guidance to schools, businesses and other congregate settings on how to best use widespread testing to slow the spread of the virus and cut off chains of transmission, according to the plan.

Reopening Schools & Businesses

Safely reopening schools and businesses is a key component of the plan. Biden signed an order on Thursday that directs the Department of Health and Human Services to collect data on school reopenings and the spread of Covid, allowing for more scientific research into the risk of putting kids back in schools.

The new plan also calls on the Occupational Safety and Health Administration to take on a larger role, setting clear guidance to employers on safe workplace practices and enforcement.

Equity

And Biden, through another order, also established a "COVID-19 Health Equity Task Force" to ensure vaccines, treatments, masks and other resources reach everyone, including harder hit communities of color that have suffered from disproportionately high death rates in the U.S.

Also, the administration proposed a $1.9 trillion coronavirus rescue package last week. The proposal, called the American Rescue Plan, includes $350 billion in state and local government aid, $170 billion for K-12 schools and institutions of higher education, $50 billion toward Covid testing and $20 billion toward a national vaccine program.

3rd Day - 2 Executive Orders Signed by President Biden

Helping families in need

The first of Friday's executive orders calls for the Department of Agriculture to consider enhancing Pandemic-EBT benefits by 15%, which would give a family with three children more than $100 in additional support every two months. The program, part of the relief packages Congress passed last March, provides funds to low-income families whose children's schools have closed to replace the free or reduced-price meals they would have received.

Also, the order directs the department to consider allowing states to boost food stamp benefits for about 12 million Americans who did not benefit from an earlier increase in emergency allotments included in the congressional relief packages. The order would bump up benefits for a family of four by 15% to 20% per month.

And the President is asking the agency to look into revising its Thrifty Food Plan, which is the basis for determining food stamp benefits, to better reflect the current cost of a healthy basic diet. The calculation was established in the 1970s, and advocates say it makes unrealistic assumptions about food affordability and availability, as well as about the time families have to shop and prepare meals.

In addition, Biden will ask the Treasury Department to consider taking a series of actions to reach the estimated 8 million people who may miss out on their stimulus payments because they don't normally file taxes.

And the executive order directs the Department of Labor to consider clarifying that unemployed Americans can refuse to take jobs they fear will jeopardize their health and still qualify for unemployment benefits.

$15 wages as a Federal Baseline

Biden's second executive order is geared toward improving the jobs of federal workers and contractors, which was among the President's campaign commitments. It sets the stage for requiring contractors to pay a $15 hourly minimum wage and to provide emergency paid leave by the end of Biden's first 100 days. It also directs agencies to determine which federal workers are earning less than that minimum and develop recommendations to promote bringing them up to $15 an hour.

The President included a call to raise the national hourly minimum wage to $15 as part of the $1.9 trillion relief package he outlined last week before taking office. It is currently $7.25 an hour.

The order will also revoke three executive orders signed by then-President Donald Trump in 2018 that made it easier to terminate federal employees and weaken their labor unions. The measures have been the subject of litigation and arbitration. 

Biden's action directs agencies to bargain over permissible, non-mandatory subjects in contract negotiations.

Edited January 22, 2021 by MANiCURE1295

[BenG]

President Joe Biden will call Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and Mexican President Andrés Manuel López Obrador today. The calls with be President Biden's first calls to foreign leaders since taking office.

[HeavyMetalLover]

2 hours ago, MANiCURE1295 said:

 

3rd Day - 2 Executive Orders Signed by President Biden

Helping families in need

The first of Friday's executive orders calls for the Department of Agriculture to consider enhancing Pandemic-EBT benefits by 15%, which would give a family with three children more than $100 in additional support every two months. The program, part of the relief packages Congress passed last March, provides funds to low-income families whose children's schools have closed to replace the free or reduced-price meals they would have received.

Also, the order directs the department to consider allowing states to boost food stamp benefits for about 12 million Americans who did not benefit from an earlier increase in emergency allotments included in the congressional relief packages. The order would bump up benefits for a family of four by 15% to 20% per month.

And the President is asking the agency to look into revising its Thrifty Food Plan, which is the basis for determining food stamp benefits, to better reflect the current cost of a healthy basic diet. The calculation was established in the 1970s, and advocates say it makes unrealistic assumptions about food affordability and availability, as well as about the time families have to shop and prepare meals.

In addition, Biden will ask the Treasury Department to consider taking a series of actions to reach the estimated 8 million people who may miss out on their stimulus payments because they don't normally file taxes.

And the executive order directs the Department of Labor to consider clarifying that unemployed Americans can refuse to take jobs they fear will jeopardize their health and still qualify for unemployment benefits.

$15 wages as a Federal Baseline

Biden's second executive order is geared toward improving the jobs of federal workers and contractors, which was among the President's campaign commitments. It sets the stage for requiring contractors to pay a $15 hourly minimum wage and to provide emergency paid leave by the end of Biden's first 100 days. It also directs agencies to determine which federal workers are earning less than that minimum and develop recommendations to promote bringing them up to $15 an hour.

The President included a call to raise the national hourly minimum wage to $15 as part of the $1.9 trillion relief package he outlined last week before taking office. It is currently $7.25 an hour.

The order will also revoke three executive orders signed by then-President Donald Trump in 2018 that made it easier to terminate federal employees and weaken their labor unions. The measures have been the subject of litigation and arbitration. 

Biden's action directs agencies to bargain over permissible, non-mandatory subjects in contract negotiations.

Oh no, Biden is going to crash our already disastrous economy by driving up costs with this silly $15 per hours minimum wage. Whatever shall we do?

[BenG]

The passive aggression 

Accept that no policy is perfect and that includes minimum wage. 

[MANiCURE1295 Pronounshe/him]

On 1/22/2021 at 12:56 PM, MANiCURE1295 said:

 

3rd Day - 2 Executive Orders Signed by President Biden

Helping families in need

The first of Friday's executive orders calls for the Department of Agriculture to consider enhancing Pandemic-EBT benefits by 15%, which would give a family with three children more than $100 in additional support every two months. The program, part of the relief packages Congress passed last March, provides funds to low-income families whose children's schools have closed to replace the free or reduced-price meals they would have received.

Also, the order directs the department to consider allowing states to boost food stamp benefits for about 12 million Americans who did not benefit from an earlier increase in emergency allotments included in the congressional relief packages. The order would bump up benefits for a family of four by 15% to 20% per month.

And the President is asking the agency to look into revising its Thrifty Food Plan, which is the basis for determining food stamp benefits, to better reflect the current cost of a healthy basic diet. The calculation was established in the 1970s, and advocates say it makes unrealistic assumptions about food affordability and availability, as well as about the time families have to shop and prepare meals.

In addition, Biden will ask the Treasury Department to consider taking a series of actions to reach the estimated 8 million people who may miss out on their stimulus payments because they don't normally file taxes.

And the executive order directs the Department of Labor to consider clarifying that unemployed Americans can refuse to take jobs they fear will jeopardize their health and still qualify for unemployment benefits.

$15 wages as a Federal Baseline

Biden's second executive order is geared toward improving the jobs of federal workers and contractors, which was among the President's campaign commitments. It sets the stage for requiring contractors to pay a $15 hourly minimum wage and to provide emergency paid leave by the end of Biden's first 100 days. It also directs agencies to determine which federal workers are earning less than that minimum and develop recommendations to promote bringing them up to $15 an hour.

The President included a call to raise the national hourly minimum wage to $15 as part of the $1.9 trillion relief package he outlined last week before taking office. It is currently $7.25 an hour.

The order will also revoke three executive orders signed by then-President Donald Trump in 2018 that made it easier to terminate federal employees and weaken their labor unions. The measures have been the subject of litigation and arbitration. 

Biden's action directs agencies to bargain over permissible, non-mandatory subjects in contract negotiations.

4th Day Biden Executive Orders

Repeal of the Transgender Ban in the Military

Today, President Biden repealed the ban of openly transgender men and women from serving in the military. Essentially this EO states that all qualified American who are able to serve their country in uniform are able to do so without issue. Please see the below link for more details...

“Therefore, it shall be the policy of the United States to ensure that all transgender individuals who wish to serve in the United States military and can meet the appropriate standards shall be able to do so openly and free from discrimination”

The EO also states...that they will go through records to find people who were discharged and work to reinstate them immediately....

“.....identify and examine the records of service members who have been involuntarily separated, discharged, or denied reenlistment or continuation of service on the basis of gender identity or under circumstances relating to their gender identity;”

https://www.whitehouse.gov/briefing-room/presidential-actions/2021/01/25/executive-order-on-enabling-all-qualified-americans-to-serve-their-country-in-uniform/

Buy America First 

The order aims to increase domestic manufacturing by harnessing the purchasing power of the federal government and closing loopholes for companies taking business overseas. What Biden will sign Monday is an order, which will increase how much of a product must be made in the US for it to qualify as made in America. Trump’s directives encouraged new grant and loan recipients to use iron, steel, aluminum, cement and other manufactured products produced in the US, but did not mandate it.

Currently, a patchwork of federal rules requires that a portion of government spending on things like infrastructure, vehicles and other equipment is restricted to goods that are made in the United States. But there are loopholes depending on the material, the amount of the purchase, and what qualifies as American made. 

Biden's executive order will change how domestic content is defined and measured for qualifying products as well as increase the required threshold. It will also create a senior position at the Office of Management and Budget to oversee the process by which contractors can apply for waivers from the Buy American rules, with the goal of reducing the number of waivers granted. 

The administration will also create a public website that will post all waiver requests and direct agencies to proactively connect with small American manufacturers that are often left out of the process.

Covid 19 Travel Restrictions

Reinstates Covid-19 restrictions for individuals traveling to the United States from the Schengen Area, the United Kingdom, Ireland and South Africa

Edited January 25, 2021 by MANiCURE1295

[thetea]

On 1/22/2021 at 8:01 AM, NotDoctor said:

Biggest news of this administration so far: Biden has removed Trump's Diet Coke button

 

The one thing I agree with Trump on. I love Coke but I always have to have diet because I'm at increased risk of diabetes so I would love a diet coke button

[thetea]

Why isn't minimum wage higher? Most developed countries make minimum wage higher every so often to account for the fact that the value of a dollar goes down over time

[MANiCURE1295 Pronounshe/him]

On 1/20/2021 at 8:10 PM, MANiCURE1295 said:

Details of 17 Executive Orders Signed by Biden on First Day in Office:

COVID-19 response 

1) Start a "100 Days Masking Challenge," calling for a nationwide face mask and social distancing mandate in federal buildings, on federal lands and by federal employees and contractors. 

2) Restructure federal government coordination to the COVID-19 pandemic. The Biden White House is bringing back an Obama-era position called the "Directorate for Global Health Security and Biodefense," which was organized with additional staff within the National Security Council after the 2014 Ebola epidemic. This directorate office was dispersed into other roles during the Trump administration, but Biden and his campaign advisers argued the move decreased the preparedness of the federal government for the COVID-19 pandemic. Biden will also formally implement a "response coordinator" who will report to the president on vaccine, testing and personal protective equipment production, supply, and distribution. Biden has appointed Jeff Zients, who has been overseeing Biden's COVID-19 team for the presidential transition.  

3) Rejoin the World Health Organization (WHO), which the Trump administration was in the process of leaving. Biden is also looking to reestablish the U.S. as an active leader at the WHO. 
 

Financial relief for Americans

4) Extend eviction and foreclosure moratoriums. Biden will call on the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention to re-implement and extend the already defunct moratorium until at least March 31. The new president will also call on the Departments of Agriculture, Housing and Urban Development, and Veterans Affairs to extend the foreclosure moratoriums for their federally backed mortgages. "These emergency measures are important," Mr. Biden's top economic adviser Brian Deese said on the call with reporters, "There are more than 11 million mortgages guaranteed by the VA, Department of Agriculture and HUD that would be extended."   
 

5) Continue "pause" on student loan payments until September 30. The Biden advisers continue to assert Biden still supports his campaign pledge to cancel $10,000 of student loans, but this will take time as it has to go through Congress.  
 

Environment 

6) Rejoin the Paris Climate Agreement. The Paris climate negotiations took place under the Obama administration and were led by incoming climate change czar John Kerry when he was  secretary of state. This will take 30 days to go into effect.  

7) End Keystone XL pipeline and revoke oil and gas development at national wildlife monuments. To do this, Biden's climate adviser Gina McCarthy explained the Biden administration will discard or redo more than 100 "harmful" presidential proclamations, memoranda or permits signed by the Trump administration that the new administration views as detrimental to the environment. Other changes include directing agencies to "consider revising vehicle fuel economic and emissions standards" and placing federal working groups to deal with greenhouse gases, according to an outline of the executive orders.

Human rights 

8) Actions to advance racial equity through the federal government. Incoming Domestic Policy Adviser Susan Rice explained President Biden wants every federal agency to review equity in their programs and actions. For example, with this executive action the Office of Management and Budget will analyze if federal money is equitably distributed in communities of color and other places of need, the outline of the executive action said. Rice also said Trump's "harmful" 1776 Commission, the 18-member board he formulated in September, will be stopped. The commission's goal was to study the president's concern that the American education system was taking a too liberal approach to American history.  
 

9) Count non-citizens in U.S. Census again.  This reverses President Trump's order in July 2020 to not count undocumented Americans, which would affect federal allocation of money and federal representation. 

10) Strengthen workplace discrimination protections based on sexual orientation and gender identity. At agencies, this broadens the federal protections against sex discrimination to include LGBTQ Americans.

Immigration 

11) Defend "Dreamers" program for undocumented young Americans. In this executive order, calls on Congress to grant permanent status and a path to citizenship to Dreamers — almost a million undocumented young people who were brought to the country as children and shielded from deportation by President Obama. The Trump administration challenged the law but the Supreme Court upheld it. 

12) End so-called "Muslim travel ban”, which in 2017 restricted travel and immigration to the U.S. from Syria, Iran, Iraq, Sudan, Libya, Somalia and Yemen, before adding Eritrea, Nigeria, Myanmar, Kyrgyzstan, and Tanzania in 2020. The State Department is also instructed to restart visa applications for these countries.  
 

13) Change Trump's arrest priorities for Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE). This executive order will repeal the changes Mr. Trump made in the first week of his presidency in 2017 to make interior immigration enforcement much stricter. Few specifics were listed in the outline of the executive order, but the incoming Biden White House team stated the Department of Homeland Security, in partnership with other agencies, will "set civil immigration enforcement policies that best protect the American people and are in line with our values and priorities." 

14) Stop border wall construction. Biden will end the national emergency declaration cited by the Trump administration to divert money to the building of the southern wall.  

15) Keep protections for a group of Liberians in the country. Liberians who have been in the United States for many years will be able to remain longer. Their "deferred enforcement departure" will be extended an additional year, until June 30, 2022. President Trump briefly considered ending this deferment before ultimately extending the program.

Regulation 

16) Freezing last-minute Trump administration regulatory actions. Technically, White House chief of staff Ron Klain will be charged with carrying out this out, and a presidential memo will formally state the regulations to be frozen. 

Ethics 

17) Formulate Executive Branch ethics doctrine. Biden wants every executive branch appointee to sign an ethics pledge. The pledge also demands federal employees promise "to uphold the independence of the Department of Justice," the executive order outline states. 
 

I WORKED SO HARD ON THIS I HOPE YALL LOVE IT 

 

On 1/21/2021 at 5:44 PM, MANiCURE1295 said:

2nd Day - 10 Executive Signings Related to the COVID pandemic

Masks

Hours after being sworn in as the 46th president on Wednesday, Biden signed more than a dozen executive actions in the Oval Office, including one requiring masks on federal property.

The president said Thursday he will also call on governors, local health officials, mayors and business leaders to encourage mask wearing and social distancing.

Travel

Biden is also requiring masks on public transportation, including trains, buses and aircraft. International travelers will need to present a negative Covid-19 test before entering the U.S. and will have to quarantine upon arrival. The executive order also directs other agencies to expand public health measures for domestic travel and cross-border land and sea travel.

Supply Chain

Biden also directed agencies to use the Defense Production Act to compel companies to make supplies needed to combat the pandemic. That could include protective equipment like masks as well as supplies needed for Covid-19 tests and to administer vaccines. The Trump administration invoked the act last year to get U.S. manufacturers to make ventilators and other supplies.

The executive order, called "A Sustainable Public Health Supply Chain," also directs "the development of a new Pandemic Supply Chain Resilience Strategy" in an effort to bolster domestic manufacturing of critical supplies.

State and Local Support

The administration is also seeking to accelerate the rollout of vaccines by providing more funding to local and state officials, creating more vaccination sites and launching a national public education campaign. The plan says the administration will also "surge the health care workforce to support the vaccination effort," which could include waiving some licensing requirements, for example.

Biden previously announced that his administration will aim to administer 100 million vaccine shots in its first 100 days. Jeff Zients, Biden's coordinator for the Covid response, said on a conference call Wednesday evening that that's just the beginning.

Biden will direct the Federal Emergency Management Agency to set up 100 community vaccination centers in the next month as part of that effort. Similar to the Trump administration, Biden's plan will also encourage states to move quickly to expand the groups eligible to receive the vaccine.

COVID Response Office

To bolster trust in the government's response, the White House is establishing a "COVID-19 Response Office," charged with coordinating the pandemic response across federal agencies and establishing clear lines of communication down to local officials. The federal government will also conduct regular, expert-led briefings, the plan says.

Data Collection

Biden signed another executive order directing the response office and all federal agencies to improve federal data collection and sharing. It directs the CDC to publish a dashboard showing Covid-19 cases at the county level, "so that Americans can gauge the level of transmission in their own communities to make their own informed choices," the plan says.

New Treatments

Even as the vaccination effort gains speed, the plan calls for continued research into treatments for Covid, especially antivirals like Gilead's remdesivir. Through an executive order called "Improving and Expanding Access to Care and Treatment for COVID-19," Biden established a new drug discovery and development program that emphasizes diversity in clinical trials.

That order also expanded programs designed to support patients recovering from Covid-19, the plan says, and increased the health-care workforce capacity.

Testing

In addition to new drugs, Biden's plan also places a renewed emphasis on more testing. The president established a new pandemic testing board to discover new kinds of effective and rapid tests and scale them up quickly.

The federal government will also provide guidance to schools, businesses and other congregate settings on how to best use widespread testing to slow the spread of the virus and cut off chains of transmission, according to the plan.

Reopening Schools & Businesses

Safely reopening schools and businesses is a key component of the plan. Biden signed an order on Thursday that directs the Department of Health and Human Services to collect data on school reopenings and the spread of Covid, allowing for more scientific research into the risk of putting kids back in schools.

The new plan also calls on the Occupational Safety and Health Administration to take on a larger role, setting clear guidance to employers on safe workplace practices and enforcement.

Equity

And Biden, through another order, also established a "COVID-19 Health Equity Task Force" to ensure vaccines, treatments, masks and other resources reach everyone, including harder hit communities of color that have suffered from disproportionately high death rates in the U.S.

Also, the administration proposed a $1.9 trillion coronavirus rescue package last week. The proposal, called the American Rescue Plan, includes $350 billion in state and local government aid, $170 billion for K-12 schools and institutions of higher education, $50 billion toward Covid testing and $20 billion toward a national vaccine program.

 

On 1/22/2021 at 12:56 PM, MANiCURE1295 said:

 

3rd Day - 2 Executive Orders Signed by President Biden

Helping families in need

The first of Friday's executive orders calls for the Department of Agriculture to consider enhancing Pandemic-EBT benefits by 15%, which would give a family with three children more than $100 in additional support every two months. The program, part of the relief packages Congress passed last March, provides funds to low-income families whose children's schools have closed to replace the free or reduced-price meals they would have received.

Also, the order directs the department to consider allowing states to boost food stamp benefits for about 12 million Americans who did not benefit from an earlier increase in emergency allotments included in the congressional relief packages. The order would bump up benefits for a family of four by 15% to 20% per month.

And the President is asking the agency to look into revising its Thrifty Food Plan, which is the basis for determining food stamp benefits, to better reflect the current cost of a healthy basic diet. The calculation was established in the 1970s, and advocates say it makes unrealistic assumptions about food affordability and availability, as well as about the time families have to shop and prepare meals.

In addition, Biden will ask the Treasury Department to consider taking a series of actions to reach the estimated 8 million people who may miss out on their stimulus payments because they don't normally file taxes.

And the executive order directs the Department of Labor to consider clarifying that unemployed Americans can refuse to take jobs they fear will jeopardize their health and still qualify for unemployment benefits.

$15 wages as a Federal Baseline

Biden's second executive order is geared toward improving the jobs of federal workers and contractors, which was among the President's campaign commitments. It sets the stage for requiring contractors to pay a $15 hourly minimum wage and to provide emergency paid leave by the end of Biden's first 100 days. It also directs agencies to determine which federal workers are earning less than that minimum and develop recommendations to promote bringing them up to $15 an hour.

The President included a call to raise the national hourly minimum wage to $15 as part of the $1.9 trillion relief package he outlined last week before taking office. It is currently $7.25 an hour.

The order will also revoke three executive orders signed by then-President Donald Trump in 2018 that made it easier to terminate federal employees and weaken their labor unions. The measures have been the subject of litigation and arbitration. 

Biden's action directs agencies to bargain over permissible, non-mandatory subjects in contract negotiations.

 

On 1/25/2021 at 2:33 PM, MANiCURE1295 said:

4th Day Biden Executive Orders

Repeal of the Transgender Ban in the Military

Today, President Biden repealed the ban of openly transgender men and women from serving in the military. Essentially this EO states that all qualified American who are able to serve their country in uniform are able to do so without issue. Please see the below link for more details...

“Therefore, it shall be the policy of the United States to ensure that all transgender individuals who wish to serve in the United States military and can meet the appropriate standards shall be able to do so openly and free from discrimination”

The EO also states...that they will go through records to find people who were discharged and work to reinstate them immediately....

“.....identify and examine the records of service members who have been involuntarily separated, discharged, or denied reenlistment or continuation of service on the basis of gender identity or under circumstances relating to their gender identity;”

https://www.whitehouse.gov/briefing-room/presidential-actions/2021/01/25/executive-order-on-enabling-all-qualified-americans-to-serve-their-country-in-uniform/

Buy America First 

The order aims to increase domestic manufacturing by harnessing the purchasing power of the federal government and closing loopholes for companies taking business overseas. What Biden will sign Monday is an order, which will increase how much of a product must be made in the US for it to qualify as made in America. Trump’s directives encouraged new grant and loan recipients to use iron, steel, aluminum, cement and other manufactured products produced in the US, but did not mandate it.

Currently, a patchwork of federal rules requires that a portion of government spending on things like infrastructure, vehicles and other equipment is restricted to goods that are made in the United States. But there are loopholes depending on the material, the amount of the purchase, and what qualifies as American made. 

Biden's executive order will change how domestic content is defined and measured for qualifying products as well as increase the required threshold. It will also create a senior position at the Office of Management and Budget to oversee the process by which contractors can apply for waivers from the Buy American rules, with the goal of reducing the number of waivers granted. 

The administration will also create a public website that will post all waiver requests and direct agencies to proactively connect with small American manufacturers that are often left out of the process.

Covid 19 Travel Restrictions

Reinstates Covid-19 restrictions for individuals traveling to the United States from the Schengen Area, the United Kingdom, Ireland and South Africa

5th Day - 4 Executive Orders Signed by Biden

Promote Fair Housing

One executive order ordered the Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) to look at the effects of Trump administration actions on housing. Any actions that “undermined fair housing policies and laws” will prompt the implementation of new requirements set by the Fair Housing Act.

Ending Private Prisons

Another order planned to end the use of private prisons. Specifically, it directed the federal government not to renew contracts with such companies.

Strengthen Relationship with Native American Tribes

A third order was concerned with “tribal sovereignty and consultation”, according to an administration handout. It will order the federal government to retain a dialogue with tribal governments.

Combating Xenophobia

The fourth Biden order on Tuesday was aimed at fighting xenophobia against Asian Americans and Pacific islanders. The order acknowledged the history of discrimination and harassment against those groups, and said the federal government would recognize “the harm that these actions have caused” and condemn xenophobic actions against those groups.

Biden also ordered the Department of Health and Human Services to weigh whether to issue guidance “to advance cultural competency” for these groups as part of the administration’s efforts to battle Covid-19. The executive order also directed the justice department to work with Asian American and Pacific island communities to fight harassment and hate crimes.

[Franz Ferdinand]

5 minutes ago, MANiCURE1295 said:

Ending Private Prisons

Another order planned to end the use of private prisons. Specifically, it directed the federal government not to renew contracts with such companies.

Just to specify here, it instructs the DOJ not to renew contracts with private prisons. It doesn't say anything about other federal bodies (like ICE, for instance). So, while this is a step in the right direction, it needs to go so much further.

[MANiCURE1295 Pronounshe/him]

38 minutes ago, Elizabeth II said:

Just to specify here, it instructs the DOJ not to renew contracts with private prisons. It doesn't say anything about other federal bodies (like ICE, for instance). So, while this is a step in the right direction, it needs to go so much further.

Susan Rice spoke on that today actually 

“...Rice noted in the briefing that Biden's order to the DOJ does not apply to private-prison contracts with other agencies, such as Immigration and Customs Enforcement.

That order is "silent on what may or may not transpire with ICE facilities," she said, while stressing that the latest actions are "just the beginning" of the administration's racial equity push....”

Hopefully other actions are on the way, glad to see this new administration moving in this direction though. Gotta accept these wins when we get them  but you are right! More can definitely be done 

Edited January 26, 2021 by MANiCURE1295