There is a new administration in charge of the country. Hopes are high that it will be a return to normalcy after the undeniable chaos that came as a result of the Trump presidency. But there’s just one problem, Biden isn’t normal.

Biden, within the first 12 days of being in office, signed 42 executive orders. To compare with recent presidents, Trump signed 12 in his first month, and Franklin Delano Roosevelt signed 30 in his first month, the previous record. Breaking a record like that is certainly not normal. An executive order is a rule issued by the president to the executive branch of government that has the force of law, and many of these orders are radical.

Most of these orders are clearly designed to undo Trump’s presidency, such as the “Proclamation on the Termination of Emergency With Respect to the Southern Border of the United States” and “Redirection of Funds Diverted to Border Wall Construction”, a clear shot at destroying what was possibly the most popular symbol of Trump’s presidency. Some are extremely radical, such as promoting transgender access to bathrooms, locker rooms, and school sports. Or promoting Obamacare, pushing the country ever closer to socialism, and therefore communism.

Some of the orders led to entertaining outcomes. Biden, on his first day in office, signed the “Executive Order on Protecting the Federal Workforce and Requiring Mask-Wearing,” which requires mask-wearing on federal property. Biden immediately disobeyed his own order when he was seen with his family at the Lincoln memorial without a mask on. Normally, I wouldn’t care if someone wasn’t wearing a mask if they are alone with their family, but the fact that he disobeyed his own order hours after signing it is pretty hilarious. When asked about why he hadn’t worn a mask, White House Press Secretary Jen Psaki gave the excuse that Joe Biden was “celebrating” and that there were bigger issues to worry about. I agree that there probably are bigger things to worry about right now, but the hypocrisy of the government was clearly showing.

Some of the orders are downright detrimental to the economy and society. Biden’s “Executive Order on Protecting Public Health and the Environment and Restoring Science to Tackle the Climate Crisis” will destroy an estimated 11,000 jobs in an effort to decrease the US’ impact on climate change. Not only is this order harmful to the already fragile economy, it might be entirely useless. Democrat senator Jon Tester, who supports the efforts to combat climate change, admitted that the order would do more harm than good. 

Possibly the worst of all the orders was Biden’s “Executive Order on Ensuring an Equitable Pandemic Response and Recovery.” It promotes an equitable response to the COVID-19 pandemic. It prioritizes people of color over white people through the use of equity. Equity is far different from equality. Equality is usually seen as equal opportunity, rather than equity, which is seen as equality of outcome, thus favoring entire racial groups of people over another, which is racism. This order is racist towards white people, and it seems to me that many people ignore the possibility of racism towards white people. Racism simply means discriminating against one group of people on the basis of race, so it is possible to be racist towards white people, as this order shows.

All of these orders show that President Joe Biden is not normal. He is creating radical changes in government and to the country and won’t even follow some of his own rules. The call for a return to normalcy doesn’t seem to be happening anytime soon with this administration.