President Obama is eyeing up major executive actions for his final year in office. The President is considering executive actions that would expand gun background checks and close GITMO.
The AP reported on Obama final year schedule, “The president is packing his final year with foreign travel and has about a half-dozen trips abroad planned, including a likely visit to Cuba. The White House’s legislative agenda is slim and centers mostly on areas where he already has overlapping priorities with Republicans, including final passage of the Trans-Pacific Partnership trade pact and criminal justice reform. But he’s also eyeing provocative executive actions, including an expansion of background checks for gun purchases and the closure of the Guantanamo Bay detention center.”
On December 10, 2015, it was reported the White House was in the process of finalizing an executive action that would expand background checks on gun sales without congressional approval.
On November 4, 2015, White House Press Secretary Josh Earnest suggested that the President has not ruled out using executive action to close GITMO. Earnest said, “At this point, I would not take anything off the table in terms of the president doing everything that he can to achieve this critically important national security objective.”
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If President Obama takes these steps, he will change the political landscape in 2016. Obama could end up dominating the presidential campaign without being a candidate. The President is using every single moment of his time in office to take actions that will help keep innocent Americans and our nation safer.
Obama has demonstrated that the lame duck second term is more of a media construct than a political reality. This president has had a blazing final half of his second term. The President continues to score victories for the American people on a regular basis, but his final two proposed executive actions could set off a political earthquake that has the potential to shape the discussion during the 2016 presidential campaign.
Instead of behaving like a lame duck, Barack Obama remains the king of America’s political jungle.
Jason is the managing editor. He is also a White House Press Pool and a Congressional correspondent for PoliticusUSA. Jason has a Bachelor’s Degree in Political Science. His graduate work focused on public policy, with a specialization in social reform movements.
Awards and Professional Memberships
Member of the Society of Professional Journalists and The American Political Science Association
