Sun Sentinel Palm Beach Edition
The new administration gets down to business.
WASHINGTON — Freshly sworn in to office, President Donald Trump set about Friday trying to deliver the change he promised as he took the helm of the vast executive branch bureaucracy and began steering it toward a new conservative-dominated government.
Away from the pomp and circumstance of Inaugura- tion Day that celebrated the hand-over of power to Trump from former President Barack Obama, the nuts-and-bolts implementation began largely behind the scenes.
In a ceremonial office of the Capitol shortly after he took the oath, Trump signed papers nominating candidates for Cabinet secretary posts, paving the way for their confirmations. Hours later, the Republican-led Senate voted 98-1 to approve retired Gen. James Mattis as secretary of defense and 88-11 to approve John Kelly, another retired Marine general, as head of Homeland Security.
And Friday night in the Oval Office, Trump signed a largely symbolic executive order directing agencies to take steps to “ease the burden” of the Affordable Care Act, Obama’s signature health care law, as Republicans work to repeal and replace it.
An hour after Trump assumed the presidency, the Department of Housing and Urban Development indefinitely suspended a pending rate cut for mortgage insurance required for government-backed home loans.
The move reverses a policy announced in the waning days of the Obama administration that would have trimmed payments for borrowers by hundreds of dollars a year.
Similar directives were being made at other agencies, an adviser said, though not all were expected to be announced.
Ben Carson, Trump’s nominee for housing secretary, singled out the policy for scrutiny during his confirmation hearing last week amid GOP concerns about whether taxpayers would be responsible for the loans if they started to go sour.
Like many other candidates in the lengthy presidential campaign, Trump had identified dozens of actions he intended to take on his first day in office. As Trump’s inauguration approached, aides increasingly focused on which would ultimately make the list.
But a fluke of the calendar meant that the most significant changes would wait at least another few days. With the inauguration falling at the end of the work week and additional celebratory events planned over the weekend, aides said Friday that the most significant actions — probably on health care and foreign policy — would wait until Monday.
Nevertheless, the rocky nature of the transition meant Trump was forced to ask dozens of Obama administration appointees to stay on until he could fill their jobs.
And the business of government did not pause for the transfer of power. The Pentagon announced Friday that U.S. drones and warplanes launched airstrikes the day before on an al-Qaida training camp in northwestern Syria, killing more than 100 militants. Though the U.S. bombs Islamic State fighters daily in Syria, it does not hit al-Qaida strongholds nearly as often.
The strike was authorized by the outgoing Obama administration; Trump may pull back U.S. support for rebels struggling against President Bashar Assad’s government.
Republican congressional leaders signaled their readiness to work with the new president, even if his style was one that at times discomfited some in the party.
“He has been underestimated often. But he never let it stop him from succeeding,” Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., said in a toast to Trump at a congressional luncheon in his honor. “We are wishing him similar success as he turns to the charge of governing.”
McConnell criticized Democrats who he said were standing in the way of additional confirmation votes.