Speaker 1: Welcome to brain Stuff, a production of I Heart Radio,
Speaker 1: Hey brain Stuff. Lauren Boglebaum here. The minute that Joe
Speaker 1: Biden assumed presidency of the United States, the clock started
Speaker 1: taking on his first hundred days in office. Well before
Speaker 1: he was elected. Biden was promising decisive action in his
Speaker 1: first hundred days to combat the COVID nineteen pandemic, rebuild
Speaker 1: the economy, and address racial injustice and inequity. But why
Speaker 1: the fascination with the president's first a hundred days? After all,
Speaker 1: we've elect presidents for terms of one thousand, four hundred
Speaker 1: and sixty days, So what's so important about these first
Speaker 1: three months in change? Blame f DR for the article.
Speaker 1: This episode is based on How Stuff Works. Spoke with
Speaker 1: Jonathan Ladd, Associate professor of Public policy and Government at
Speaker 1: Georgetown University. He said, we started using the term first
Speaker 1: a hundred days after Franklin D. Roosevelt first a hundred days.
Speaker 1: FDR's first a hundred days were so productive that we've
Speaker 1: talked about it ever since. FDR came to office in
Speaker 1: ninety three. In the depths of the Great Depression, he
Speaker 1: signed seventy six pieces of legislation in his first hundred days,
Speaker 1: including fifteen major overhauls and new programs. He took the
Speaker 1: US off the gold standard, revamped the banking system, and
Speaker 1: created jobs through the Civilian Conservation Corps and the Tennessee
Speaker 1: Valley Authority. No president since has even come close to
Speaker 1: FDR's productivity. Kennedy passed twenty six bills, Reagan just nine,
Speaker 1: Obama only eleven, but that hasn't shaken the fixation on
Speaker 1: the first hundred days. It remains a benchmark of political
Speaker 1: efficiency and a convenient measure of a new president's power.
Speaker 1: A study showed that before the nineteen fifties, the average
Speaker 1: number of laws passed during a president's first hundred days
Speaker 1: was forty six, compared with sixteen for later time periods.
Speaker 1: In his first undred days, Biden has spearheaded some bold initiatives,
Speaker 1: including signing a one point nine trillion dollar pandemic recovery package.
Speaker 1: He's also doubled the goal his administrations set for COVID vaccinations,
Speaker 1: surpassing two hundred million vaccinations by his first hundred days
Speaker 1: instead of the original goal of a hundred million. He's
Speaker 1: also called for all US troops to be pulled from
Speaker 1: Afghanistan by September eleventh of this year. Biden has also
Speaker 1: signed a historic sixty executive orders, memos, and proclamations, the
Speaker 1: most by any president at his first hundred days, a
Speaker 1: third of which were direct reversals of executive orders signed
Speaker 1: by his predecessor, Donald Trump. Most of those reversals undid
Speaker 1: Trump era policies on immigration, the environment, and equity. For instance,
Speaker 1: Biden revoked Trump's executive order that separated migrant families at
Speaker 1: the US Mexico border. In an article for five thirty
Speaker 1: eight dot com, political scientist Julia Azari noted that presidents
Speaker 1: often enjoy a honeymoon with Congress during their first hundred days,
Speaker 1: making it easier to push the new White Houses legislative agenda,
Speaker 1: and the effect is strongest for presidents who confront divided government.
Speaker 1: One possible explanation for the hundred day honeymoon is that historically,
Speaker 1: most incoming presidents enjoyed high approval ratings with voters. In
Speaker 1: those less divisive times, Senators and representatives from the opposing
Speaker 1: party would cross the aisle, is a nod to presidential
Speaker 1: popularity and more importantly, to assuage voters back home. For example,
Speaker 1: even though President George W. Bush won the two thousand
Speaker 1: election by the slimmest of margins. He was popular enough
Speaker 1: that conservative leaning Democrats helped pass his tax cut package
Speaker 1: early in his tenure. Trump had no such luck, and
Speaker 1: Biden hasn't either. The lad said popularity matters less now
Speaker 1: because there are a lot fewer conservative Democrats and liberal
Speaker 1: Republicans than they're used to be. Plus, Trump and Biden
Speaker 1: were significantly less popular than previous incoming presidents. Trump's approval
Speaker 1: ratings at his inauguration were in the high thirties at
Speaker 1: the hundred day mark it stood at. Biden's approval rating
Speaker 1: was on his hundred day mark significantly lower than Barack
Speaker 1: Obama or Ronald Reagan sixty eight percent at the same
Speaker 1: point in their first terms in office, and beside Trump,
Speaker 1: the only other president with a lower approval rating at
Speaker 1: a hundred days than Biden was Gerald Ford at forty
Speaker 1: eight percent. The bipartisan honeymoon of the past appears to
Speaker 1: be over. Not one Republican member of Congress voted for
Speaker 1: Biden's pandemic relief bill, for example, and as of this writing,
Speaker 1: it's unclear whether Biden has the votes to pass its
Speaker 1: ambitious two trillion dollar Infrastructure Plan. Another reason why moral
Speaker 1: legislation often gets passed by in the first a hundred
Speaker 1: days often has to do with the political changing of
Speaker 1: the guard. When the White House in Congress are finally
Speaker 1: controlled by the same party, previously defeated bills get a
Speaker 1: second chance at life. President Bill Clinton signed the Family
Speaker 1: and Medical Leave Act within days of taking office. He
Speaker 1: could act so swiftly because the same bill had previously
Speaker 1: been passed by Congress and vetoed by President George H. W. Bush.
Speaker 1: The same thing happened with the Lily Ledbetter Fair Pay Act,
Speaker 1: which President Barack Obama signed into law nine days after
Speaker 1: his inauguration. If President stands, then Biden's most substantial legislative
Speaker 1: moves will come well beyond the somewhat arbitrary hundred day mark.
Speaker 1: President Lyndon B. Johnson didn't sign the Voting Rights Act
Speaker 1: until seven months into his term, and Obama didn't enact
Speaker 1: the Affordable Care Act until more than a year into
Speaker 1: his first term. Today's episode is based on the article
Speaker 1: why do we care about the first hundred Days? On
Speaker 1: how Stuff works dot com, written by Dave Rooms. Brain
Speaker 1: Stuff is production of I Heart Radio in partnership with
Speaker 1: how stuffworks dot com and is produced by Tyler Klang.
Speaker 1: Four more podcasts My Heart Radio, visit the heart Radio app,
Speaker 1: Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.