President Trump Rescinds Executive Orders Impacting Executive Personnel Ethics Commitments and Census Parameters

On January 20, 2025, President Trump signed Executive Order 14148 rescinding a series of “Harmful Executive Orders and Actions” of the Biden Administration, including provisions affecting federal ethics and the census count.

President Biden’s Executive Order 13989 required every executive agency appointee to sign an ethics pledge. This commitment prohibited appointees’ connections with lobbyist activities such as receiving gifts and leveraging the “revolving door” status of their position to later secure more favorable private and foreign job prospects, until at least two years after their service. Revoking these guidelines, Trump has aligned with his first-term actions, having issued his own 2017 Ethics Commitments before removing those restrictions on his last day in office.

In another similar policy rollback, Trump repealed Executive Order 13986, which previously expanded census data tabulation of total state population to include all individuals whose usual residence was in each state, regardless of immigration status (see previous COSSA coverage). In the 2019 case Department of Commerce v. New York, the Supreme Court blocked the Trump Administration’s attempt to include a citizenship status question on the 2020 census (see COSSA’s statement here). With the rescinding of this order, there will likely be shifts in population numbers used for the allocation of Electoral College votes and congressional seats, as well as for the distribution of federal funding for infrastructure and social programs.

Stay tuned to COSSA’s coverage for all the details as the new Administration takes shape over the coming weeks.

This article was contributed by COSSA Intern Sarah Wang.