Second presidency of Donald Trump
's second tenure as the current president of the United States began upon his inauguration as the 47th president on January 20, 2025. Trump, a member of the Republican Party, previously served as the 45th president from 2017 to 2021. He lost re-election to Democratic Party candidate Joe Biden in the 2020 presidential election, and then won against Democratic candidate Kamala Harris in the 2024 election. Trump is the second U.S. president to serve non-consecutive terms. Alongside Trump's second presidency, the Republican Party also currently holds majorities in the House of Representatives and the Senate during the 119th U.S. Congress following the 2024 elections, thereby attaining an overall federal government trifecta.
During 2025, Trump signed 225 executive orders, the most of any president in a single year since Franklin D. Roosevelt. Many of these have been or are being challenged in court. His attempts to expand presidential power and conflict with the courts have been described as a defining characteristic of his second presidency. The Trump administration has taken action against law firms for challenging its policies. On immigration, Trump signed the Laken Riley Act into law, revived numerous immigration laws from his first presidency, attempted to restrict birthright citizenship, and initiated procedures for mass deportations, including nationwide raids by Immigration and Customs Enforcement. In January 2025, Trump launched the Department of Government Efficiency, with Elon Musk briefly overseeing it. DOGE was tasked with reducing federal spending and limiting bureaucracy, and it oversaw mass layoffs of civil servants along with efforts to dismantle government agencies such as the Agency for International Development.
Trump has overseen a series of tariff increases and pauses, which has led to retaliatory tariffs from other countries. These tariff moves, particularly the "Liberation Day" tariffs, caused a brief stock market crash and subsequent market volatility.
In international affairs, Trump has further strengthened U.S. relations with Israel. His administration increased support for Israel in the Gaza war and aided Israel in the June 2025 Iran–Israel war and carried out strikes on Iranian nuclear sites. In early October, Trump's plan for a Gaza ceasefire deal between Israel and Hamas was signed. Amid the Russo-Ukrainian war that began in 2022, the Trump administration undertook multiple attempts at peace negotiations described as favoring Russia over Ukraine. Trump has authorized a series of lethal strikes on suspected drug traffickers in the Caribbean Sea, whose legality is widely disputed under both U.S. and international law, and subsequently ordered a military operation to capture Nicolás Maduro, the disputed president of Venezuela. As in his first presidency, Trump initiated the withdrawal of the U.S. from the World Health Organization, the Paris Climate Accords, and UNESCO.
In December 2025, the Trump administration achieved deals with 14 of the largest 17 pharmaceutical companies, with these companies agreeing to provide Medicare recipients the lower European prices on many prescription drugs. In return, these companies will receive tariff exemptions for three years.
His second administration has been criticized for its targeting of political opponents and civil society. Many of his administration's actions have been found by judges to be illegal and unconstitutional, and have been criticized as authoritarian and contributing to democratic backsliding. Trump is the first president with a felony conviction. At 78 years old and seven months, he is the oldest person to become U.S. president. Following his electoral victories in 2016 and 2024, he is constitutionally ineligible from seeking further terms due to the Twenty-second Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, although many of his associates have discussed the possibility of him running for a third term.
Milestones
2024 election
Trump, who previously served as the 45th president of the United States from 2017 to 2021 and lost his reelection bid to Joe Biden in the 2020 presidential election, announced his candidacy for the nomination of the Republican Party in the 2024 presidential election on November 15, 2022. In March 2024, Trump secured the Republican nomination. Trump selected Senator JD Vance of Ohio, a former critic of his, as his running mate, and the two were officially nominated at the 2024 Republican National Convention. On July 13, Trump was the victim of an attempted assassination during a campaign rally in Butler, Pennsylvania.Early on November 6, 2024, the day after the election, Trump was projected to have secured the presidency. Trump won the presidential election with 312 electoral votes and 49.8% of the popular vote, while Kamala Harris received 226 electoral votes and 48.3% of the popular vote. Trump, upon taking office, became the second president in U.S. history to serve non-consecutive terms after Grover Cleveland in 1893, the oldest individual to assume the presidency, and the first with a felony to serve the presidency after his conviction in May 2024. Vance, as the third-youngest vice president in U.S. history, became the first millennial vice president. In the concurrent congressional elections, Republicans secured a government trifecta after retaining their majority in the House of Representatives and winning back control of the Senate.
Transition period and inauguration
The presidential transition period began following Trump's victory in the 2024 U.S. presidential election, though Trump had chosen Linda McMahon and Howard Lutnick to begin planning for the transition in August 2024. According to The New York Times, Trump was "superstitious" and preferred to avoid discussing the presidential transition process until after Election Day. His transition team relied on the work of the America First Policy Institute, rather than the Heritage Foundation, a conservative think tank that garnered controversy during the election for Project 2025, a set of initiatives that would reshape the federal government. By October, he had not participated in the federal presidential transition process, and he had not signed a required ethics pledge, as of November.During the transition period, Trump announced nominations for his cabinet and administration. Trump was inaugurated on January 20, 2025. He was sworn in by Chief Justice John Roberts. The inauguration occurred indoors in the Capitol Rotunda. Two days before the inauguration, Trump launched a meme coin, $Trump. In his first weeks, several of Trump's actions ignored or violated federal laws, regulations, and the Constitution.
First 100 days
In Trump's first hundred days in office, he signed 143 executive orders, the most of any president in this period, 42 presidential memoranda, 42 presidential proclamations, the Laken Riley Act, a continuing appropriations act, and other pieces of legislation for Congress. Trump's extensive use of executive orders drew a mixed reception from both Republicans and Democrats. Some executive orders tested the limits of executive authority, and others faced immediate legal challenges. Major topics Trump focused on included immigration reform, deportations, applying tariffs on other countries, cutting federal spending, reducing the federal workforce, increasing executive authority, and implementing a non-interventionist foreign policy.Administration
Cabinet
Trump's cabinet choices were described by news media as valuing personal loyalty over relevant experience, and for having a range of conflicting ideologies and "eclectic personalities". It was also described as the wealthiest administration in modern history, with over 13 billionaires chosen to take government posts. He nominated or appointed 23 former Fox News employees to his administration. Notably, Trump's nomination of Scott Bessent as Secretary of the Treasury made Bessent the highest ranking openly LGBTQ person to serve in the United States government.Loyalty tests
Once the second Trump presidency began, White House screening teams fanned out to federal agencies to screen job applicants for their loyalty to the president's agenda. On his first day in office, Trump signed an executive order asserting to restore merit-based federal hiring practices and "dedication to our Constitution". As part of its U.S. federal deferred resignation program, the Trump administration demanded "loyalty" from federal workers. In a break from politically neutral speech, the Justice Department issued memos about "insubordination", "abhorrent conduct" and vowed to pursue opponents of Trump's cost-cutting efforts "to the ends of the Earth" in what was described by current and former law enforcement officials as a campaign of intimidation against agents insufficiently loyal to Trump.Staffers were dispatched across federal agencies to look for anti-Trump sentiment among government agencies. Some new hires were told to provide examples of what they did to help Trump's 2024 presidential campaign, when their moment of "MAGA revelation" occurred, prove their "enthusiasm", be positively referenced by confirmed loyalists, and provide access to their social media handles. The Associated Press described the intense loyalty tests as a way to separate individuals following traditional Republican orthodoxy from Trump's MAGA ideology. Candidates for top national intelligence and law enforcement positions were given Trump loyalty tests. Candidates were asked to give yes or no responses to whether or not January 6 was an "inside job" and whether or not the 2020 election was "stolen". Those that did not say yes to both answers were not hired.