President Joe Biden has signed dozens of executive orders during his first week in office, months after asserting that a president should legislate with a “consensus” or risk becoming a “dictator.”
His first week in office, Biden signed 32 executive orders, according to a tally by NBC News. That number is more than triple the number of orders the previous three U.S. presidents – George W. Bush, Barack Obama, and Donald Trump – signed in each of their first weeks in office, combined. According to the Federal Register, Bush signed no executive orders his first week in office, Obama signed five, and Trump signed four.
Biden once said that in the United States, a president needs a “consensus” to legislate on certain issues or “you’re a dictator.” Biden was discussing tax policy during an October town hall with ABC News host George Stephanopoulos. The then-Democratic nominee for president rejected the idea that he would use an executive order to increase taxes.
“I got to get the votes,” Biden said, responding to a Stephanopoulos question on tax increases. “That’s why, you know, I have this strange notion, we are a democracy. Some of my Republican friends and some of my Democratic friends even occasionally say, ‘Well, if you can’t get the votes, by executive order you’re going to do something.’ Things you can’t do by executive order unless you’re a dictator. We’re a democracy. We need consensus.”
.@JoeBiden in October: “I have this strange notion, we are a democracy … if you can’t get the votes … you can’t [legislate] by executive order unless you’re a dictator. We’re a democracy. We need consensus.” pic.twitter.com/7UotJCXSm3
— Tom Elliott (@tomselliott) January 26, 2021
Read the full story here: WATCH: Joe Biden Once Said Democracy Needs ‘Consensus.’ He Signed 32 Executive Orders His First Week | The Daily Wire