Trump’s many executive orders – and some potential effects

Donald Trump was sworn in as President of the US on Jan. 20 and has already issued many executive orders (EOs). These are all are published on the White House website under “Presidential Actions.” (Old EOs can be found in the Federal Register.) We are reviewing those that seem most likely to affect the sporting goods industry, in- and outside of the US, or to raise eyebrows in Europe.

Priorities

The Trump administration says it is concerned first with four things:

• The national borders
• Energy and trade
• The federal government’s bureaucracy
• “American values”

Health

The WHO

As in the first Trump administration, the US is to withdraw from the World Health Organization (WHO), pause the transfer of funds to it, and end negotiations on its Pandemic Agreement and its International Health Regulations.

The US government is at present the WHO’s biggest single funder, having contributed close to $500 million from 2020 to 2023. Next over the same period came another American, but non-governmental, source: the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation (about $450m). Then came the UK (about $450m), Germany (about $375m) and the European Commission (about $275m).

The withdrawal would presumably exclude the US from the WHO’s campaign against physical inactivity, the subject of a talk at the recent ISPO Munich show, with panelists from Nike, Adidas, the WFSGI and the WHO itself.

(Last June we reported on the reaction from WFSGI and certain companies to the WHO’s inactivity data and interviewed WFSHI CEO Emma Zwiebler. We have also published a business special on the impact of sports.)

The WHO has since posted a statement in reply on X, which concludes as follows: “We hope the United States will reconsider and we look forward to engaging in constructive dialogue to maintain the partnership between the USA and WHO, for the benefit of the health and well-being of millions of people around the globe.”

Trade

America First

The EO on “America First Trade Policy” seeks to investigate the “country’s large and persistent annual trade deficits in goods, as well as the economic and national security implications and risks resulting from such deficits, and recommend appropriate measures, such as a global supplemental tariff or other policies, to remedy such deficits.”

Of greatest concern for the sporting goods industry is the review of trade policy with respect to China and the review of American industry and manufacturing. The EO itself opens inquiries but calls for no changes.

Also under review are the currency policy of trading partners, antidumping and countervailing duty (AD/CVD) laws, the de minimis exemption (used by Shein and Temu) and taxes levied by foreign countries, along with existing trade agreements (e.g., World Trade Organization Agreement on Government Procurement) and Trump’s own “Buy American and Hire American” EO (no. 13788).

GMT

The provisions of the Global Tax Deal, also called the Global Minimum Tax (GMT) are henceforth to have no effect within the US unless Congress adopts its provisions into law.

The deal was set up by the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) and has 140 country signatories. By its terms, large corporations must pay taxes in the jurisdictions where they do business and corporations with annual revenues in excess of $750 million must pay a global minimum tax of 15 percent.

International relations

Foreign aid

There are to be no new obligations and no further disbursements of funds to foreign countries, NGOs, international organizations or contractors for 90 days, while the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) reviews the programs and decides which, if any, to pursue.

By the federal government’s own reckoning, the US set aside $68 billion for foreign aid in 2023, $39 billion in 2024. Overall contributions for “Health” amounted to almost $10 billion in each year.

Ukraine

The country receiving the most in both years was Ukraine. Posting to Telegram, Andriy Kovalenko, head of the Central Intelligence Department at Ukraine’s National Security and Defense Council, said: “The executive order signed by US President Trump to suspend international aid for 90 days does NOT apply to military aid to Ukraine. It is about other things.”

There is, however, nothing in the text of the EO to corroborate this. There is only a statement from the US Department of State, published on Jan. 20, that reads in part as follows: “The United States reaffirms its unwavering support for Ukraine’s sovereignty and territorial integrity within its internationally recognized borders, extending to its territorial waters.”

Israel & Gaza

The foreign-aid EO presumably suspends the $230 million allocated to Palestinians by the administration of President Joseph Biden. Another EO (by rescinding Biden’s order no. 14022) restores sanctions on the International Criminal Court, which in November issued a warrant for the arrest of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, accusing him of war crimes and crimes against humanity. Reuters and others, citing Israeli service Walla News, report that the Trump administration will be lifting the Biden administration’s freeze on the sale of 2,000-pound bombs to Israel, but there appears to be no mention of or reference to this in the new Trump EOs.

NATO

Unmentioned in the EOs is NATO, the chief military alliance for the security of Europe – and thus for the business environment of a great many sports brands. In 2024 the US contributed about $968 billion to NATO’s defense budget, or about two-thirds of the total ($1.47tn). The second-biggest contribution was an order of magnitude smaller ($97.7bn) and came from Germany.

Trump has long contended that Europe must pay more into NATO than it does, and several European politicians have begun to concur in public. Kaja Kallas, Head of the European Defence Agency and HRVP, said on Jan. 21, at the agency’s annual conference: “President Trump is right to say that we don’t spend enough.” France’s President, Emmanuel Macron, expressed similar sentiments on the same day.

Foreign policy

This EO is a brief statement of principles. The new administration has instructed the Department of State to “champion core American interests and always put America and American citizens first” and its Secretary to “issue guidance bringing the Department of State’s policies, programs, personnel, and operations in line with an America First foreign policy, which puts America and its interests first.”

Foreign terrorists

At least two EOs deal with what the administration considers malevolent foreign actors.

One declares certain Mexican cartels and gangs (Tren de Agua, MS-13 et al.) to be Foreign Terrorist Organizations. This is a term of art in US law and opens the way to a variety of measures.

Another reverses a Biden administration policy and calls for Ansar Allah, commonly known as the Houthis of Yemen, to be deemed once more a Foreign Terrorist Organization. The Houthis, of course, have for months been raiding freighters in the Red Sea, which connects with one of the world’s major chokepoints for trade: the Suez Canal.

Environment

Paris Agreement

The US is to withdraw from the Paris Agreement and any other deal made under the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) and cease or revoke financial commitments thereto. The country is also rescinding the US International Climate Finance Plan, put forth by the Biden administration.

Future international energy agreements, the order reads, are to prioritize economic efficiency, the promotion of American prosperity, consumer choice and fiscal restraint.

Michael Bloomberg – co-founder of Bloomberg media, former mayor of New York City and current Special Envoy on Climate Ambition and Solutions for the UN Secretary-General – announced on Jan 23 that Bloomberg Philanthropies and others “will ensure the United States meets its global climate obligations” post-withdrawal, “covering the funding gap left by the United States to UN Climate Change (UNFCCC) and upholding the country’s reporting commitments.”

American energy

In short, Trump seeks with this EO to produce as much energy as possible within the US and is opening the way to this on Federal lands and in Federal waters.

He seeks in addition to mine non-fuel minerals, such as rare-earths (the expensive stuff in batteries and smartphones). Greenland’s richness in rare-earths, incidentally, is one of the reasons Trump has been talking about the island’s purchase by the US. The idea dates back to his first administration.

The EO also eliminates Biden’s mandate for electric vehicles (EVs).

Alaska

In general, the Trump administration seeks to open up the vast lands of Alaska to the extraction of natural resources, notably for the production of liquified natural gas (LNG).

According to the European Commission, the US supplied 46 percent of the EU’s imported LNG in 2023, far more than any other country. From 2021 to 2023 LNG increased its share of all natural-gas imports to the EU from 20 to 42 percent. LNG has in large part replaced the natural gas that was flowing into Europe from Russia through the Nordstream pipelines, three of which were blown up in the Baltic Sea in September 2022.

Also at issue in this EO are the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge (ANWR) – oil leases there having been controversial for decades – and the National Petroleum Reserve-Alaska (NPR-A).

Wind farms

There are to be no new leases or permits for the generation of electricity by wind on the outer continental shelf, off the US coast. This does not apply to leases for the mining of oil, gas or minerals or for environmental conservation.

The Secretary of the Interior will be reviewing existing leases with respect to ecological and economic matters, with a view toward amendment or termination. The ban takes effect on Jan. 21 and is temporary.

Regulations

There are to be no new rules without previous review by a department or agency head appointed by the President. Rules submitted to but not yet published in the Federal Register are to be withdrawn and subject to review. Rules published but not yet in effect may have their effective date postponed for 60 days for review.

California

The Trump administration seeks to “route more water from the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta to other parts” of California.

Trump’s previous administration tried to do something like this and was stopped by a lawsuit filed by the state. Trump himself discussed California’s troubles with water and fire on the Joe Rogan Experience podcast, shortly before the election.

Tens of thousands of acres around Los Angeles have burned since about Jan. 7.

Labor

DEI

The EO on “preferencing” seeks to “terminate, to the maximum extent allowed by law, all DEI, DEIA, and “environmental justice” offices and positions […] and all DEI or DEIA performance requirements for employees, contractors, or grantees.”

Trump has rescinded dozens of the Biden administration’s EOs, many of them with a single order – covering, among other things, “pay equity and transparency” in federal contracting (no. 14069); the procurement of goods, products, materials, and services (no. 14005); equity and inclusion (nos. 13985 and 14091); and energy and infrastructure within the purview of the Inflation Reduction Act of 2022 (no. 14082).

Most of this concerns labor and supply chains in connection with the Federal government, but it seems to reflect a change in the American Zeitgeist, which could in turn affect corporate policies.

Another EO with multiple rescissions will end an order (no. 11246) that the administration of Lyndon Baines Johnson issued in 1965 and that served as the basis of what Americans call “affirmative action,” a kind of racial preference in labor policy.

The Trump administration’s argument for this is that affirmative action and similar policies, like DEI, which both the public and the private sectors have implemented, conflict with Federal law on civil rights: e.g., the Civil Rights Act of 1964.

A separate EO instructs the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) to set aside DEI and “return to non-discriminatory, merit-based hiring, as required by law.”

Sex

The EO on gender makes it US policy “to recognize two sexes, male and female” and to consider them “not changeable” and “grounded in fundamental and incontrovertible reality.”

The term “sex,” moreover, is “not a synonym for and does not include the concept of ‘gender identity.’”

Domestic policy

DOGE

The Trump administration has established a Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE), which amounts to a reorganization and renaming of the United States Digital Service (USDS), founded in 2014. DOGE will be “modernizing Federal technology and software to maximize governmental efficiency and productivity.”

This is Elon Musk’s project, and its name is a winking reference to his long, informal and playful relationship with Dogecoin. “Lots of people I talked to on the production lines at Tesla or building rockets at SpaceX own Doge. They aren’t financial experts or Silicon Valley technologists. That’s why I decided to support Doge – it felt like the people’s crypto” [emphasis added], he tweeted on Oct. 25, 2021. This democratic notion is reflected in a comment he has at times appended to the results of polls conducted on his Twitter/X account: “Vox populi, vox dei.” In April 2023 Musk had Twitter switch out the bird logo for Dogecoin’s symbol, the head of a Shibu dog named Inu.

Speech

The administration seeks to restore the full force of the First Amendment to the US Constitution in light of what it calls the Biden administration’s coercion of third parties – notably social-media companies – to “moderate, deplatform, or otherwise suppress speech […] under the guise of combatting ‘misinformation,’ ‘disinformation,’ and ‘malinformation’ […].”

This is at odds with the European notion of “hate speech” and with aspects of the EU’s Digital Services Act (DSA), some of whose provisions have drawn comment from FESI.

In the US speech is not limited to the oral or written word but can extend to the spending of money.

National borders

Trump’s first presidential campaign was all but synonymous with “the wall” along the southern border. One of his new EOs seeks to pursue the wall’s construction, enforce existing immigration law (which provides for the expulsion of aliens, as the law calls them) and otherwise dissuade illegal entry to the US.