What major domestic policies did the Trump administration enact in 2025?
Executive summary
The Trump administration’s 2025 domestic agenda has focused intensely on deregulation, energy expansion, immigration enforcement, and implementing Project 2025 priorities—issuing hundreds of executive orders and a broad deregulatory push including what the EPA called the “Biggest Deregulatory Action in U.S. History” (March 2025) and 217 executive orders in 2025 (federal register count) [1] [2]. Watchdogs and policy centers say many actions mirror Project 2025’s playbook and that roughly half of Project 2025’s domestic agenda had been initiated by fall 2025, according to tracking by the Center for Progressive Reform [3] [4].
1. Deregulation as a headline objective
The administration prioritized sweeping rollbacks of federal rules, ordering agencies to suspend, revise or rescind actions deemed “unduly burdensome” on energy production and other industries; the EPA framed a March package as its largest deregulatory action ever [1]. Brookings and other trackers document a rapid, agency-by-agency regulatory unwind and maintain a living regulatory tracker of the administration’s rule changes and reversals [5].
2. Energy-first policy and federal-state conflicts
Early EOs such as “Unleashing American Energy” and “Protecting American Energy From State Overreach” directed agencies and the Justice Department to prioritize oil, gas, coal, hydropower, biofuels, critical minerals and nuclear energy and to challenge state laws seen as obstructive—signaling an administration strategy to override state climate and conservation actions [1]. The White House framed these moves as reversing “climate extremism” and streamlining permitting to boost domestic production [6].
3. Conservation rollback and resource access
The administration moved to open previously protected areas and reconsider conservation rules: a proclamation opened the Pacific Remote Islands Marine National Monument to commercial fishing, and proposals targeted the 2001 roadless rule and federal arrangements to protect salmon affected by dams [1]. These actions illustrate the tradeoff the administration chose between conservation and resource development [1].
4. Immigration and border enforcement priorities
The White House’s stated “America First” priorities included restoring policies like Remain in Mexico, building border infrastructure, ending catch-and-release and expanding removals; the White House statement frames a crackdown on asylum and expanded deportation operations as central [6]. These items appear repeatedly in White House briefings and were among the administration’s early domestic priorities [6].
5. Health, reproductive policy and litigation stance
The administration reinstated the Mexico City policy restricting federal global health funding to groups that provide or counsel on abortion services (a rollback from the previous administration) and engaged in litigation strategy on mifepristone access, asking a federal court to dismiss standing in a suit seeking to limit the drug [1]. These moves reflect the administration’s immediate focus on reversing Biden-era health and reproductive policies [1].
6. Project 2025: blueprint and implementation
Multiple analysts and outlets say early executive actions closely mirrored Project 2025, a conservative policy blueprint; trackers from progressive groups claim the administration actively pursued Project 2025 recommendations across many agencies and that implementation was substantial by October 2025 [7] [3] [4]. Proponents argue the playbook provided ready policy drafts and personnel plans; critics warn it embeds long-lasting institutional changes [7] [8].
7. Volume and speed: executive orders and administrative change
The Federal Register records 217 executive orders in 2025 alone—an indicator of the administration’s reliance on unilateral executive action to reshape domestic policy [2]. Legal scholars and policy centers are cataloging rule changes and court fights, underscoring the administration’s strategy of rapid administrative reengineering [5].
8. Competing perspectives and political stakes
Supporters portray these moves as restoring energy independence, cracking down on illegal immigration and reducing burdensome regulation; watchdogs and progressive groups frame them as a coordinated effort to shrink the federal government, sideline expertise, and entrench conservative policy through “sticky” rules and personnel changes [6] [8] [9]. Independent trackers—Brookings, NCSL, and regulatory monitors—document both the scale of changes and the resulting legal and administrative friction [5] [10].
Limitations and what’s not in these sources
The provided sources catalogue executive orders, deregulatory claims, Project 2025 alignment, and specific policy moves, but available sources do not mention comprehensive legislative achievements in Congress in 2025 outside of executive actions and regulatory rollbacks; they also do not provide exhaustive lists of every policy impact or the full legal status of all changes (not found in current reporting).