Sen. Amy Klobuchar sets first 100 days goals

WASHINGTON – Minnesota U.S. Sen. Amy Klobuchar, a Democratic candidate for president, vowed on Tuesday to use executive powers in her first 100 days in the White House to undo much of what President Donald Trump has done over the past 30 months.

Ahead of the first Democratic primary debates next week, Klobuchar's campaign released a hefty list of plans she would undertake in the opening months of her potential presidency.

From rejoining the Paris Agreement to fight climate change, to immediately suspending all legal challenges to the Affordable Care Act, ending family separations at the U.S. border and the travel ban on certain Muslim countries, as well as allowing transgender people to serve in the U.S. military, Klobuchar's 18-page plan reads in many parts like a direct repudiation of the Republican president.

The list includes some major legislative proposals, although most of it could be undertaken without congressional approval. It was released Tuesday morning, hours before Trump's re-election kickoff with an evening rally in Orlando, Fla.

"After four years of Donald Trump, the new president can't wait for a bunch of congressional hearings to act," Klobuchar said in a statement. The objective, she said, is "to improve our health care, combat climate change, pursue economic justice and shared prosperity, and build a stronger democracy and safer world."

Klobuchar is competing against a large group of rivals for the Democratic nomination.

Next week, 20 of those candidates will participate in one of two debates in Miami; Klobuchar will join candidates including Sens. Elizabeth Warren and Cory Booker and former Rep. Beto O'Rourke on the first night, June 26.

An analysis by the New York Times puts her national polling average at 2% — tied with Booker and trailing former Vice President Joe Biden, Sen. Bernie Sanders, Warren, Sen. Kamala Harris, Mayor Pete Buttigieg and O'Rourke.

While presidential candidates frequently talk about what they would do in their early days in office, Klobuchar's campaign was not aware of any rivals who have produced a similarly comprehensive road map for the first 100 days.

An online search Tuesday bolstered that claim. Warren, though, has impressed some Democratic activists with a flurry of detailed policy plans.

The document released by Klobuchar's campaign contains 137 separate bullet points listing actions Klobuchar would intend to undertake as president in the early months of 2021, some covering similar territory.

Many would harness the executive power of the presidency, which Trump has frequently used to accomplish policy goals outside the lawmaking process. Many of Trump's executive orders have faced legal challenges, and Klobuchar could face similar legal pushback.

• Klobuchar would rejoin the Paris climate accord on her first day in office. She would take several other steps to address climate change, including restoration of the Clean Power Plan that set carbon dioxide emission standards for the states, and introduce a "sweeping" legislative proposal to address climate change.

• Begin to bring the U.S. back into the Iran nuclear agreement, and impose full sanctions against Russia for 2016 election interference. Congress has already approved those sanctions but the Trump administration has not fully implemented them. Klobuchar would also restore greater freedom for U.S. citizens and businesses to travel to and trade with Cuba, which the current administration has limited.

• Lift the travel ban on immigrants from a handful of Muslim countries, a subject of fierce legal pushback since Trump implemented it early in his term. Klobuchar would also raise a cap on refugee admissions into the U.S., end family separations at the U.S. border, and end deportations of immigrants who came to the U.S. under age 16, and for several other classes of immigrants.

• End legal and administrative challenges to the Affordable Care Act and expand its open enrollment period, propose legislation to achieve universal health care including a public option, direct the Food and Drug Administration to grant a waiver allowing importation of cheaper prescription drugs from Canada, and restore federal funding to Planned Parenthood.

• Take executive action to prevent people who have abused dating partners from buying or owning firearms, direct the federal Centers for Disease Control to designate gun violence a public health issue, increase inspections and enforcement against gun manufacturers and sellers who violate the law, bar federal funding from being used to arm schoolteachers, and restore a federal rule meant to prevent those with severe mental illness for obtaining guns.