US Joe Biden starts his presidency with a battery of 15 decrees that undo the legacy of Donald Trump
Joe Biden has started his first day in the White House with a new wave of decisions to combat Covid-19, while his main legislative plan is a reform of illegal immigration that allows opening the doors to US nationality to more than ten millions of undocumented.
For now, the president's actions will be based on regulatory measures and Executive Orders, a formula that allows the Head of State and Government to make decisions that, provided they are not rejected by the courts, cannot be challenged by Congress. .
The fifteen Orders signed by the president on Wednesday, after his swearing in office, are just the appetizer of others for the next few days-
Biden, who began his day with a new religious service - the third in as many days - will focus in the short term on the fight against Covid-19, which has caused 408,011 lives and has made the United States the sixth country in the world with the most deaths in relation to its population.
The president has just signed ten executive orders to fight the virus, with measures such as the mandatory use of masks in airports, trains and buses, as well as new plans to extend vaccination in the United States.
Biden has assured: "With the Covid, things are going to get worse."
"In addition to the use of masks, all those who travel to the United States from another country should take
a test before getting on the plane and quarantine
when they arrive," Joe Biden reported in a conference, according to the EFE agency.
The new White House attacked the legacy of Donald Trump in the fight against the pandemic.
Jeff Zients, the coordinator of the fight against the pandemic in the new government, told CNN television, which has been very critical of the previous president, that "what we inherited from Trump is much worse than we imagined." in reference to the plans to vaccinate the population.
Zients added that "we are going to have to start from scratch" in the vaccine campaign.
Those statements come just a week after the governors of several states had expressed their discomfort at the lack of doses by the federal government.
Democrat Andrew Cuomo, who has seen his popularity rise and fall like a yo-yo due to his management of Covid-19, even raised the possibility that the state that he governs, New York, individually reach vaccine purchase agreements with manufacturers.
On the legislative front, things are more complicated for Biden.
But the new president has given a very clear signal of where his priorities will be directed by announcing that his first bill will be an immigration reform that allows access to nationality to the more than 10 million undocumented foreigners - the vast majority, Latin Americans - who reside in the United States.
It's a total break with Donald Trump, who launched his campaign declaring illegal immigrants to be "drug dealers, criminals, rapists, and some, I suppose, good people."
But, with that measure, Biden is in the wake of Barack Obama and George W. Bush, who tried - especially the former - immigration reforms that were blocked by supporters in Congress.
The last US president to carry out an amnesty for illegals was, paradoxically, Ronald Reagan, whom many Republicans cite as their model, in 1986.
Biden's project is not, however, an immediate generalized amnesty like the one carried out in Spain in 2005. It would require proof that you have resided in the United States before January 1 of this year, after which you could access a Special five-year visa, at the end of which the work permit could be requested as long as the applicant passes an exam and shows that he has no pending accounts with the Treasury.
After another three years, citizenship could be applied for.
Thus, the minimum time to access citizenship would be 8 years, in a long legal process that would require, today, the payment of approximately 2,000 dollars (1,640 euros) in taxes to the State.
The proposal, however, is not going to be immediate.
And not for Biden, but for the Senate.
That chamber is divided between 50 Republicans and 50 Democrats who have not yet agreed on how to distribute power and, above all, whether or not to maintain the so-called 'filibuster', that is, the rule that requires a majority of 60 votes to pass most of the laws.
That regulation has made the Senate practically useless, since, in a time of maximum political polarization, it is virtually impossible to reach that number of support for any bill.
That, in turn, is what has caused recent presidents - Obama, Trump, and now Biden - to turn to Executive Orders, which at least have the advantage of being immediately enforceable, though in return they produce tremendous judicialization of political life, since they are usually taken to court.
In addition, these decrees produce legal uncertainty, since they ultimately depend on the actions of a single man, the president, without any control from Congress.
In 2021 there is also another problem for Biden: the impeachment of his predecessor, Donald Trump, a consequence of the 'impeachment' launched against him after his followers' assault on Congress on January 6, in which five people died.
The impeachment trial should begin in the next few days or weeks but, being a matter of urgency, it will take precedence over immigration reform or even the ratification of senior officials in the Biden government.
Thus, the president is exposed to having a 'working cabinet' for weeks or, perhaps, months.
At the moment, the only person on her team whose appointment has been ratified by the Senate is Avril Haines, the national intelligence director.
Biden is thus the first president in modern times to begin his term with only a confirmed senior position.
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