ABC News(WASHINGTON) — In the week that will mark his 100th day in office, President Trump will sign four new executive orders, including one calling for a review of offshore-drilling regulations and another directing a review of national-monument designations on federal lands.
The president also plans to to sign an order establishing an “office of accountability and whistleblower protection” at the Department of Veterans Affairs.
The new office will be charged with helping the Veterans Affairs secretary “discipline or terminate [Veterans Affairs] managers or employees who fail to carry out their duties in helping our veterans,” according to a White House official.
Trump is also expected Tuesday to sign an executive order creating a task force “to examine the concerns of rural America and suggest legislative and regulatory changes to address them,” the White House said.
The order on national monuments will direct the Interior Department to review prior monument designations under a more than 100-year-old law that authorizes the president to establish federal lands as national monuments.
And as part of the administration’s push to expand offshore drilling, the president on Friday is expected to sign a directive called, America First Energy Executive Order, calling for a review of offshore oil and gas locations and rules.
The four new executive orders will bring Trump’s total to 32 in his first 100 days, which the White House says is the highest number by any president since World War II.
Prior to his election, Trump criticized his predecessor’s use of executive actions as a way of going around around Congress.
“I don’t think he even tries anymore. I think he just signs executive actions,” Trump said of then-President Obama in December 2015.
Trump pointed to the U.S. government’s system of checks and balances.
“That’s the way the system is supposed to work. And then all of a sudden, I hear, ‘He tried, he can’t do it,’ and then, boom, and then another one, boom,” he said.
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