Donald J. Trump was sworn in as the 45th President of the United States on Friday, January 20. Hundreds of thousands of people attended the inauguration and protests over the weekend. Nearly 70 Democratic House representatives chose not to attend the inauguration, due in part to Mr. Trump’s recent comments about Representative John Lewis (D-GA) and to what they regard as offensive statements he made while campaigning for office.
In one of his first acts as President, Mr. Trump rescinded a final act of the Obama presidency to lower Federal Housing Administration (FHA) loan mortgage rates for middle class homeowners. The policy, announced by Secretary Castro on January 9, was set to take effect on January 27 and would have saved millions of new homeowners around $500 per year. President Trump’s order indefinitely suspends the .25 percentage point premium rate cut for FHA-backed loans.
This week, Mr. Trump is expected to sign several additional executive orders imposing restrictions on immigration, directing the construction of a wall along the U.S.-Mexican border, rescinding President Barack Obama’s order to allow more than 700,000 people brought to America as children by undocumented immigrants to stay in the country on a two-year authorization to work and attend college, and halting Administration efforts to curb emissions to combat climate change, among others.