Last updated: February 7, 2025
The Trump administration has progressed further key policy priorities, while legal challenges have emerged in the areas of immigration, DEI, the federal workforce, and federal spending.
This past week, the Trump administration has continued to advance key policy priorities while facing a slew of legal actions.
Latham lawyers are carefully monitoring the rollout of President Trump’s policy priorities through executive orders, agency actions, and installment of new personnel. Below is a high-level overview of these actions, broken down by topic, along with updates on related court challenges, personnel changes, and other breaking developments in their implementation.
Regulations and Administrative Law
The Trump administration continues to progress its agenda to cut back on regulation, issuing a memorandum to all DOJ employees on February 5 titled “Reinstating the Prohibition on Improper Guidance Documents.” The memorandum takes the position that “[g]uidance documents violate the law when they are issued without undergoing the rulemaking process established by law yet purport to have a direct effect on the rights and obligations of private parties governed by the agency or otherwise act as a substitute for rulemaking,” and tasks the Associate Attorney General with developing strategies to eliminate illegal or improper use of guidance documents.
This follows an executive order requiring agencies to identify at least 10 existing rules, regulations, or guidance documents to be repealed whenever an agency enacts a new rule, regulation, or guidance. Such deregulation policies may create more favorable business conditions for certain sectors. (For more detailed information, see this blog post.)
FCPA Enforcement and Other DOJ Investigative Priorities
Following up on President Trump’s January 20 directive on drug trafficking organizations, newly confirmed Attorney General Pam Bondi announced in a February 5 memorandum that the Criminal Division’s Foreign Corrupt Practices Act (FCPA) unit will prioritize investigations related to foreign bribery that facilitates the criminal operations of cartels and transnational criminal organizations, while shifting focus away from cases that do not involve such a connection. The memorandum also potentially pushes more FCPA matters to the US Attorney’s Offices, now only requiring 24 hours’ advance notice to the FCPA unit if a US Attorney’s Office intends to pursue FCPA charges.
Attorney General Bondi also issued a General Policy Regarding Charging, Plea Negotiations, and Sentencing, which lays out general DOJ policies and sets investigative and charging priorities, including immigration enforcement, human trafficking and smuggling, transnational organized crime, cartels and gangs, national security, and protection of law enforcement. (For more information on the 14 memoranda the Attorney General issued on her first day in the role, see this blog post.)
Digital Assets and Cryptocurrency
On February 4, the Acting Chair of the Commodity Futures Trading Commission, Caroline Pham, announced that the agency’s enforcement task forces would be consolidated into a Complex Fraud Task Force and Retail Fraud and General Enforcement Task Force in order to refocus the agency away from “regulation by enforcement.” The Complex Fraud Task Force will be responsible for all preliminary inquiries, investigations, and litigations relating to complex fraud and manipulation across all asset classes. The Retail Fraud and General Enforcement Task Force will focus on retail fraud and handle general enforcement matters involving other violations of the Commodity Exchange Act.
Following Acting Chair Travis Hill’s announcement of the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation’s (FDIC’s) priority to “adopt a more open-minded and transparent approach to innovation and technology adoption, including fintech partnerships, digital assets, and tokenization” (for more detailed information, see this blog post), the FDIC released documents related to its supervision of crypto-related activities on February 5. Acting Chair Hill stated that the FDIC is “actively reevaluating our supervisory approach to crypto-related activities.”
Antitrust
The Federal Trade Commission’s (FTC’s) Premerger Notification Office posted a notice confirming that the new HSR rules will be effective as of February 10 (for more information, see this blog post).
Unless a court or Congress takes action on February 7, the effective date will likely hold. (For more detailed information, see this Client Alert.)
The new merger filing rule, which passed last October during the Biden administration, is still set to take effect on February 7 at 5 p.m. ET. The rule will expand the amount of information collected under the Hart-Scott-Rodino Act, which sets out regulatory requirements for mergers. The Trump administration has yet to comment on whether the rule will be paused.
Trade Policy
On February 1, President Trump signed three executive orders placing tariffs on Mexico, China, and Canada, effective February 4. On February 3, President Trump confirmed that tariffs on Canadian and Mexican imports would be paused for 30 days after both countries committed to increasing border enforcement. The additional 10% tariffs on “all articles that are products” of China — without any de minimis exception — took effect on February 4. (For more detailed information on navigating the new tariffs, see this blog post. To view Latham’s on-demand webcast “Navigating New Tariff and Import Trade Realities Under the Second Trump Administration,” register here.)
Immediately following the imposition of tariffs, China announced retaliatory tariffs on 80 different manufactured and energy products. Additionally, China filed a request for consultations with the World Trade Organization’s Dispute Settlement Body, challenging the US tariffs.
Immigration
The Trump administration is moving quickly to implement its executive orders relating to immigration enforcement. On February 5, the first group of migrant detainees arrived at Guantanamo Bay. On February 6, the DOJ filed its first lawsuit in the Northern District of Illinois over state sanctuary policies, citing President Trump’s proclamation of a national emergency on the southern border and his executive order declaring migration an “invasion.”
Status of Challenges
The birthright citizenship executive order is being challenged in federal district courts across the country. As of February 5, US District Judge Deborah Boardman of Maryland ordered, from the bench, a nationwide preliminary injunction blocking the birthright citizenship executive order. Similarly, on February 6, US District Judge John C. Coughenour of Washington extended his pause, granting a preliminary nationwide injunction enjoining implementation of the executive order.
The new administration’s proclamation prohibiting non-citizens from invoking asylum provisions is being challenged by three nonprofit organizations in Texas and Arizona. The nonprofit organizations filed suit on February 3, seeking declaratory judgment that the executive order is unlawful and an injunction stopping its implementation.
Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI)
Consistent with other Trump administration actions on DEI, Attorney General Bondi announced in a February 5 memorandum to all DOJ employees that the DOJ’s Civil Rights Division will “investigate, eliminate and penalize illegal [DEI] and DEIA preferences, mandates, policies, programs and activities in the private sector and in educational institutions that receive federal funds.” The memorandum instructs the Civil Rights Division and the Office of Legal Policy to submit a joint report with recommendations aimed at encouraging the private sector to end “illegal discrimination and preferences,” including DEI policies. The memorandum heightens the stakes for the public and private sector, calling for both civil and criminal enforcement. (For more detailed information on navigating these new DEI policies, see this Client Alert.)
Status of Challenges
The city of Baltimore and three other groups filed a lawsuit against the Trump administration on February 3, asking a federal court to declare the DEI-related executive orders unconstitutional. The lawsuit, filed in Maryland federal court, seeks a permanent injunction against the orders.
Federal Workforce
In another act that could reduce the overall size of the federal workforce, the Trump administration announced on February 4 its plans to put on leave all directly hired USAID employees globally and recall thousands of personnel working overseas. The USAID website states that as of February 7 at 12 a.m. ET, “all USAID direct hire personnel will be placed on administrative leave globally, with the exception of designated personnel responsible for mission-critical functions, core leadership and specially designated programs.”
Status of Challenges
In response to the 90-day pause in “foreign development assistance” and the stop-work orders for USAID, the American Foreign Service Association filed suit in the District Court for the District of Columbia.
The Trump administration’s Schedule F executive order is being challenged by nonprofits and some of the largest federal employee unions. A lawsuit filed on February 6 marks the fourth lawsuit challenging the executive order. Democracy Forward, the American Federation of State, County, and Municipal Employees (AFSCME), and American Federation of Government Employees (AFGE) — the largest federal employees union — filed a lawsuit on January 29. Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility (PEER), represented by Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington (CREW) and Democracy Forward filed a lawsuit on January 28.
The Office of Personnel Management’s directive from January 27, presenting what it described as a deferred resignation program, is being challenged by a federal employees’ union. On February 6, a US district judge issued an order to pause the Thursday deadline for over 2 million federal employees to accept a buyout offer and extend the deadline until Monday when a hearing is scheduled.
Federal Spending
Last week, the Acting Director of the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) issued a memorandum “requir[ing] every federal agency to temporarily pause” any agency activities “that may be implicated by [President Trump’s] executive orders.”
The memorandum spurred legal challenges from a coalition of nonprofit organizations. On February 3, US District Judge Loren L. AliKhan issued a temporary restraining order (TRO) blocking the OMB from implementing its funding freeze. The order directed the OMB to release the frozen funds, notify agencies of this TRO, and file a status report on compliance by February 7.
Energy and Environment
Consistent with President Trump’s series of executive orders and memoranda on energy and environment, Attorney General Bondi issued a memorandum on February 5 to all DOJ employees undoing several executive orders from the previous administration. The memorandum rescinds all Attorney General memoranda, guidance, or similar directive that implement the prior administration’s “environmental justice” agenda.
Key Appointments and Personnel Moves
As of February 7, the following additional Cabinet posts have been confirmed: Chris Wright (Energy); Doug Collins (Veterans Affairs); Pam Bondi (Attorney General); Scott Turner (Housing and Urban Development); and Russell Vought (OMB).
Hearings have been held, but confirmations have not been secured for: Brooke Rollins (Agriculture); Elise Stefanik (Ambassador to the UN); Kelly Loeffler (Small Business Administration); Howard Lutnick (Commerce); Kash Patel (FBI); Tulsi Gabbard (Director of National Intelligence); and Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. (Health and Human Services).
Nominees awaiting hearings include: Lori Chavez-DeRemer (Labor); Jamieson Greer (Trade Representative); and Linda McMahon (Education).
