President-elect Donald Trump promised a spate of executive orders when he takes office as president Monday, suggesting at a Sunday rally in Washington, D.C., that among them will be action on the Jan. 6 rioters.
“Everybody in this very large arena will be very happy with my decision on the J6 hostages,” he said of the defendants and those convicted of crimes related to the Jan. 6, 2021, assault on the Capitol. Trump has long expressed sympathy for his supporters accused or found guilty of crimes for their involvement in the riot. He recently claimed there were no guns used that day, though a number of defendants were charged with and pleaded guilty to crimes related to carrying firearms.
“I think you’ll be very, very happy, I would say about 99.9% of this beautiful arena,” Trump said Sunday night at Capital One Arena.
Trump is expected to sign roughly 200 executive actions — which include executive orders, presidential memoranda, proclamations and any other presidential directives — on Monday, CBS News has learned. Some of them are expected to be signed at Capital One Arena while the rest will be signed at the White House.
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The president-elect predicted, “You’re going to have a lot of fun watching television tomorrow,” and he riffed on an unnamed aide who he claimed urged him not to sign too many executive orders Monday after being sworn in.
“Somebody said yesterday, ‘Sir, don’t sign so many in one day. Let’s do it over a period of weeks.’ I said, ‘Like hell, we’re going to do it over weeks. We’re going to sign them.’ ‘Let’s do it later.’ And it never gets done.”
“No, we’re doing up tomorrow,” he said. “I will have plenty to sign in the future — don’t worry about it. It’s not going to stop.”
Other executive actions Trump mentioned during the rally include getting “wokeness” out of the military; directing the military to construct an “Iron Dome” missile defense shield made entirely in the U.S.; and making public the remaining records relating to the assassinations of President John F. Kennedy, his brother, Robert F. Kennedy, and Martin Luther King, Jr.
He also vowed to take action on the southern border, education and diversity, equity and inclusion measures.
The president-elect also discussed plans for TikTok, saying he had no choice but to save the popular social media app because of the jobs it creates. After the Supreme Court ruled Friday that a law banning the app was constitutional, Trump said that he would extend the implementation of the law by 90 days, which would be allowed under the law. Trump in his first time unsuccessfully tried to ban the app with an executive order, but has since changed his tune on the issue.
He spoke Sunday about a proposal under which the U.S. would own 50% of TikTok and have a partner who he claimed would assume all of the risk.
“So they’ll have a partner, the United States, and they’ll have a lot of bidders, and the United States will do what we call a joint venture, and there’s no risk. We’re not putting up any money,” Trump said. Trump said he spoke with Apple CEO Tim Cook Sunday and told the crowd Cook would make a “massive” investment in the U.S. It was not clear whether this was related to TikTok.
The president-elect also briefly reflected on the assassination attempt against him last summer in Butler, Pennsylvania, when a gunman clipped his ear before law enforcement killed the shooter. Trump said he still has a throbbing feeling in his ear from where the bullet grazed him.
contributed to this report.
