Trump’s Day-One Executive Orders Correct Course on Censorship, Gender Ideology, DEI

Through four executive orders on his first day in office, President Trump began working to defend our God-given rights.
Ryan Bangert

Written by Ryan Bangert

Published January 27, 2025

Trump’s Day-One Executive Orders Correct Course on Censorship, Gender Ideology, DEI

On his first day back in office, President Trump signed over two dozen executive orders. He signed several of them in front of a large and celebratory crowd in Capital One Arena in Washington, D.C.

The executive orders spanned a variety of issues, and they provide a window for us into a new administration’s priorities. While the details of every executive order that could affect your freedoms can’t be covered here, several orders showed promising signs of positively influencing Alliance Defending Freedom’s work, including orders rolling back harmful gender ideology and rejecting government censorship and DEI efforts.

Of course, these executive orders are just the beginning. The test of success is whether they create change throughout government, law, and society. Alliance Defending Freedom has been doing that work for years, and we look forward to being in the fight together with President Trump to advance religious freedom, free speech, parental rights, and the sanctity of life.

What is an executive order?

According to the American Bar Association, an executive order is “a signed, written, and published directive from the President of the United States that manages operations of the federal government.” After a president signs an executive order, it is published in the Federal Register.

Executive orders do not require congressional approval, and they cannot be overturned by Congress. But they must be consistent with law and can be overturned by the sitting president, meaning incoming presidents have the power to reverse executive orders issued by their predecessors.

Once an executive order is signed, it sometimes takes weeks or months for it to be fully implemented. This timeline can be drawn out in the event of a lawsuit challenging implementation of the order for being inconsistent with the Constitution or federal law. This happens most commonly when a challenge is filed after a federal agency issues guidance or rules or takes other steps to execute an order.

Since the beginning of our American republic, presidents have had the power to sign executive orders. In fact, every president has signed at least one during his term.

During the last four years, President Joe Biden signed 162 executive orders spanning from sanctions on Russia to the establishment of a “White House Gender Policy Council.” President Trump signed 220 in his first term, highlighted by promoting free speech and religious liberty and preventing online censorship.

On the first day of his second term, President Trump signed 26 executive orders. Let’s highlight four orders covering three key areas that directly relate to our work at ADF.

Gutting gender ideology

President Trump signed an order on gender ideology rejecting the lie that individuals can change their sex. For years, the Biden administration promoted this falsehood. And the administration tried to enforce that position through federal law.

President Trump’s new order is clear. It states that “it is the policy of the United States to recognize two sexes, male and female.” While this seems so obvious that it shouldn’t need to be said, it is paramount given the Biden-Harris administration’s attempt to include “gender identity” under the definition of sex.

On that front, the executive order specifies that the term “sex” in federal law refers to “an individual’s immutable biological classification as either male or female,” not any self-asserted “gender identity.”

The order also says that the Biden-Harris administration misread the U.S. Supreme Court’s decision in Bostock v. Clayton County, claiming the decision meant that “sex” should be redefined to encompass “gender identity” in federal laws generally, including Title IX. Alliance Defending Freedom has challenged the Biden-Harris administration’s attempted redefinition of “sex” in Title IX in numerous lawsuits, and a federal court ruling recently struck down these changes on a nationwide basis, holding that they cannot be enforced anywhere in the country.

The Biden-Harris administration also attempted to redefine “sex” in Section 1557, the non-discrimination provision of the Affordable Care Act, which could force medical professionals and insurance providers to perform or pay for harmful drugs and surgeries that purport to change one’s gender.

Thankfully, President Trump has instructed the attorney general to “immediately issue guidance to agencies to correct the misapplication of the Supreme Court’s decision in [Bostock],” paving the way for Title IX and Section 1557 to be restored to their true meaning and purpose.

Protecting free speech

In two other executive orders, President Trump took the first step toward ending federal government censorship. The orders highlight how the Biden-Harris administration misused vague terms such as “misinformation,” “disinformation,” and “malinformation” to infringe on Americans’ right to free speech “in a manner that advanced the Government’s preferred narrative about significant matters of public debate.” The orders point to, among other things, the Department of Justice’s campaign against parents protesting at school board meetings and the White House’s effort to force social media companies to cancel voices that disagreed with the government’s discriminatory COVID-19 policies.

We’ve seen that campaign up close here at ADF as the Biden-Harris administration misused the law to target American citizens, including arresting and prosecuting peaceful pro-life advocates under the FACE Act and colluding with big banks to surveil Americans’ private financial data and target them as “threats” based solely on their speech.

We’ve worked with clients whose bank accounts have been shut down on spurious grounds, and even testified before Congress against abuses of the FACE Act and the Treasury Department’s data collection project.

President Trump’s orders begin the important work of shining sunlight on these practices and holding the government accountable for crushing free speech under the guise of ferreting out misinformation and disinformation.

The order on “Restoring Freedom of Speech and Ending Federal Censorship” says the policy of the United States will now be “to … secure the right of the American people to engage in constitutionally protected speech” and “ensure that no Federal Government officer, employee, or agent engages in or facilitates any conduct that would unconstitutionally abridge the free speech of any American citizen.”

This order also states that no taxpayer resources will be used to censor Americans’ speech. It instructs the attorney general to investigate instances of alleged government censorship from the last four years and recommend any actions that should be taken to address this censorship.

The other order on “Ending the Weaponization of the Federal Government” aims to end the government’s abuse of power in targeting American citizens. It says the United States’ policy will be “to identify and take appropriate action to correct past misconduct by the Federal Government related to the weaponization of law enforcement and the weaponization of the Intelligence Community.”

The order directs the attorney general to review the actions of federal agencies over the previous four years that may constitute examples of weaponizing the government and submit a report to President Trump. In addition, the order requires the director of national intelligence to conduct a similar review of the intelligence community.

Combatting DEI

Finally, President Trump issued an order beginning the important work of uprooting government-sponsored discrimination based on race, sex, and religious beliefs by ordering an end to the government’s radical commitment to discriminatory diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) policies.

DEI policies claim to help increase the representation of minority groups within various organizations, including the federal government. But they often pursue this goal by discriminating against other groups that are deemed to be “privileged.”

At ADF, we’ve seen the harmful effects of DEI on our clients in schools that have demeaned students because of their race and fired teachers simply for speaking the truth. We’ve seen it in corporations that trample freedom of speech in the name of ideology.

Our Constitution enshrines equal protection under the law, and President’s Trump’s order is a major step in the right direction. As the executive order puts it, “Federal hiring should not be based on impermissible factors, such as one’s commitment to illegal racial discrimination under the guise of ‘equity,’ or one’s commitment to the invented concept of ‘gender identity’ over sex.”

The order says the administrator of the Department of Government Efficiency must develop a hiring plan that will prevent the government from hiring individuals based on their race, sex, or religion; prevent hiring anyone who is not committed to defending the U.S. Constitution; and prioritize people who are “passionate about the ideals of our American republic.”

ADF’s work continues

All four of these executive orders help advance priorities that ADF has long focused upon and advanced. But this doesn’t mean the fight is over. This is only round one.

President Trump’s opponents are already gearing up to challenge his commitments to protect free speech, religious freedom, and biological truth. Opposition to these principles will not end simply because he has taken office.

While these executive orders are certainly something to be celebrated, they only apply to the federal government. We must continue defending our God-given rights in state legislatures and courts across the country.

ADF has been doing that work for years, and we look forward to working alongside President Trump for the next four years on these important issues across the country.

Related Articles

Ohio County Penalizes Christian Ministry for Hiring Only Christians
Ohio County Penalizes Christian Ministry for Hiring Only Christians
We March Because We Care
We March Because We Care
New Survey Reveals a Crisis of Self-Censorship in Higher Education
New Survey Reveals a Crisis of Self-Censorship in Higher Education
Meeting the Moment: Opportunities for ADF in a Second Trump Administration
Meeting the Moment: Opportunities for ADF in a Second Trump Administration
To top