President Joe Biden and aides on Thursday pushed back against growing criticism of the president’s heavy reliance on executive orders in his first days in office, after The New York Times ran an op-ed arguing “this is no way to make law” and Republican Senate leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) suggested Biden was acting like a “dictator.”
Biden, in just over a week, has already signed more than three dozen executive orders and directives aimed at addressing the pandemic and a spate of other issues including environmental regulations and immigration policies. He has also sought to use the orders to erase foundational policy initiatives by former President Donald Trump, such as halting the construction of the U.S.-Mexico border wall and reversing a Trump-era Pentagon policy that largely barred transgender people from serving in the military.
