Trump takes executive action to reinstate pro-life foreign aid policy and orders federal hiring freeze - 'except for the military'

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President Donald Trump sent several more of his predecessor's policies through the paper shredder this morning.

Trump made full use of his executive authority to halt Barack Obama's Pacific Rim trade policy and institute a federal hiring freeze that affects all departments - 'except for the military,' Trump was quick to add.

Reversing a policy Obama put into place on the same day eight years ago when he began his administration, Trump also moved to prohibit non-governmental organizations from receiving foreign aid if they perform abortions.  

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President Donald Trump signed three more memorandums this morning as he continued to use executive actions to send his predecessor's agenda through the paper shredder

The policy was put in place by Ronald Reagan in August of 1984 and was revoked by Bill Clinton. George W. Bush changed the policy again when he took office, reinstating the Reagan policy. With Trump, the pendulum swung to the right again as he signed a memo today returning to the rules imposed by Bush. 

Trump directed the State Department to 'take all necessary actions, to the extent permitted by law, to ensure that U.S. taxpayer dollars do not fund organizations or programs that support or participate in the management of a program of coercive abortion or involuntary sterilization.'

The memo pertaining to the hiring freeze said it affected all 'federal civilian employees' and would be 'applied across the board in the executive branch.'

It left room for exceptions such as Trump's cabinet and other executive appointments.

Additionally, department and agency heads 'may exempt from the hiring freeze any positions that it deems necessary to meet national security or public safety responsibilities.

'In addition, the Director of the Office of Personnel Management (OPM) may grant exemptions from this freeze where those exemptions are otherwise necessary.'

The freeze will stay in place until the White House's Office of Management and Budget recommends 'a long-term plan to reduce the size of the Federal Government's workforce through attrition.' 

It bars the contracting of workers to circumvent the memorandums intentions. 

Trump is on a mission to undo as many of the Obama-era policies he campaigned against as he can in his first 100 days.

He took an ax to Obamacare with his first Oval Office directive Friday. Trump ordered agencies to begin prepping for legislative action that will repeal and replace ex-Obama's health law by 'minimizing the economic burden' of the existing legal requirements.

He had his chief of staff Reince Priebus issue a memo to government agencies mandating that they abide by ‘an immediate regulatory freeze' the same day.

Trump's team had said that Obama's 12-nation trade agreement, the Trans-Pacific Partnership, was next.

He formally withdrew from it as he signed memos earlier today. 

'In order to ensure these outcomes, it is the intention of my Administration to deal directly with individual countries on a one-on-one (or bilateral) basis in negotiating future trade deals,' he said in the order.

Trump's also looking to change the terms of the North American Trade Agreement. 

The White House said Saturday that he'll meet with Mexico's president, Enrique Pena Nieto, to discuss the trade pact next week. He'll soon have a face-to-face meeting with Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeam, as well.

The president is also expected to make official his five-year lobbying ban on senior administration officials and cement his policy on the border wall in short order.  

He's already said he'd order his administration to begin a 90-day review of Russian hacking and cybersecurity vulnerabilities within the government. That mandate could stay on hold until his national security team is in place. 

The Senate will vote on his intended CIA Director, Kansas Congressman Mike Pompeo. today. It has not yet looked at his nominee for direction of national intelligence, Dan Coats, a Republican senator from Indiana.  

His defense secretary already in place, Trump is also ready to begin issuing orders to his joint chiefs of staff pertaining to the fight against ISIS, a lobbyist with knowledge of Trump's plans told online news publication Axios.

Trump's team has looked at 200 potential executive orders for him to sign right off the bat, Reuters reported, on climate change policy, immigration, and energy, among other issues. 

Actions on immigration said to be in the pipeline in addition to the border wall had to do with sanctuary cities, which Trump has said he'd direct the federal government to defund, the expansion of E-Verify, and a formal policy on the extreme vetting policy that the president he'd institute to combat terrorism.

Trump hosts a meeting with business leaders in the Roosevelt Room of the White House this morning. He'll sign executive orders next

A Trump source told Axios that the list of orders being queued up includes 'dozens for the EPA.'    

'EPA has clean water-related and some 30,000 foot regulatory ones lined up [immediately]...We have dozens for the EPA...Starting Monday through the month of February. We have to roll them out gradually.'

The new president's team has been promoting a 'robust' agenda for the Republican leader's first days in office. 

'He is committed to not just Day 1, but Day 2, Day 3 of enacting an agenda of real change, and I think that you're going to see that in the days and weeks to come,' White House Press Secretary Sean Spicer said the day before Trump took office.

Spicer said Trump would sign executive orders on the Trans-Pacific Partnership and the North American Free Trade Agreement, NAFTA, 'shortly.'