Biden's 'sneaky' and 'dirty' plot to slow down Trump on Day One... despite promising a 'smooth' transition

President Joe Biden enacted a series of roadblocks to slow down Donald Trump's agenda during the president-elect first days in the White House, despite his steadfast promises to cooperate with the incoming administration.

The moves include changing the order of succession in federal agencies so pro-Biden staffers will be in charge before Trump's nominees can be confirmed, and enacting federal rules that will take the new administration months to overturn. 

The White House has also doled out billions in federal funds on clean energy initiatives and other Biden priorities.

'They're playing dirty during the transition period,' Ezra Cohen, a former Undersecretary of Defense for Trump and a current Hudson fellow, told DailyMail.com.

'When President Trump's going to be in office, dealing with actual, real problems … now he has to deal with stuff like this,' he added. 'It's just bad for America that they're doing this.'

Although Cohen conceded that none of it is 'insurmountable,' he emphasized that the moves were 'just about throwing sand in the gears to try to interfere with President Trump.'

The Biden administration simply claims it's just securing the president's legacy. Biden is giving two speeches during his final week in office that are designed to defend his tenure. And his social media accounts have been actively tossing out ambitious claims about his presidency.

Most presidents spend their final weeks in the Oval Office shoring up their initiatives and making sure their priorities stay protected under the new commander-in-chief. And Biden publicly pledged to cooperate on the transition, which was a change from the 2020 election when Trump refused to concede to him and made no effort to facilitate a government handover.

However, Biden, in an interview with USA Today last week, also laughed when the news outlet asked him about Trump trying to overturn his initiatives.

'I think he's going to have a problem,' the president said. 'Trump's going to have a hard time undoing a lot, I think.'

The Trump team is preparing to hit the ground running. Trump plans at least 100 executive orders on Inauguration Day. But Biden has implemented several policies that can't be undone with a simple swipe of the new president's pen.

And Trump seems to realize that. He's accused Biden of being 'sneaky.'

'They try to be sneaky,' he told reporters at Mar-a-Lago last week. 'They go in and they say, remember, this is a man that said he wants to transition to be smooth. Well, you don't do these kind of things.'

Here's are some areas where Biden is making it difficult for Trump:

ORDERS OF SUCCESSION

Biden has updated the order of succession at several federal agencies, rearranging the reporting order to ensure officials friendly to his policies are in charge while Trump gets his Cabinet nominees confirmed.

When a president leaves office, all of his Cabinet nominees and political appointees resign so the incoming president can put his own people in place.

But the new top officials have to be confirmed to their jobs by the Senate. Republicans are in charge on Capitol Hill during that process but, still, it takes time to hold confirmation hearings and then a formal vote of the 100 senators.

One of the many agencies where Biden reordered things is the Department of Justice. Biden issued an executive order putting the U.S. Attorney for the District of New York in charge once Attorney General Merrick Garland and his lieutenants resign on Inauguration Day.

But the attorney for the District of New York resigned two weeks before Biden signed the new succession, which puts the U.S. Attorney for Arizona next in line.

Republicans charge that attorney – Gary Restaino – is a Biden appointee who doesn't support Trump's border policies. And Restaino would be in charge of federal cases until Trump gets his attorney general nominee and top Justice Department staff confirmed.

'They're trying to put hand-picked career people in place that will make President Trump's first couple days or weeks in office more difficult,' Cohen told DailyMail.com

'They're doing it across multiple departments and agencies. And you know what it means is until President Trump gets his people confirmed, there is a risk that you will have hand-picked people by the previous administration in place, in control of these departments and agencies, and you know that's obviously going to make things more difficult.'

Trump had this fight with the Justice Department in his first administration. He tangled with acting Attorney General Sally Yates, who refused enforce his tightened strictures on entering the country, while he tried to get his nominees confirmed.

Restaino leads the U.S. Attorney's Office for the District of Arizona. An 18-month investigation by The Arizona Republic found, during his tenure, there were far more people are arrested for human smuggling by U.S. Border Patrol than are prosecuted Restaino.

Republicans now charge Restaino isn't tough enough on migrants, which is one of Trump's top issues.

Additionally, Biden last week extended Temporary Protected Status for immigrants living in the U.S. from some countries, including Venezuela, El Salvador and Ukraine.

That move could benefit about a million migrants who will be shielded from deportation for up to 18 months.

In his first term, Trump tried to revoke the TPS designation for six countries but was blocked by the courts.

SPEND, SPEND, SPEND

President Biden is trying to spend as much as federal funds possible from his four major legislative accomplishments to he can dictate where the taxpayer money goes instead of leaving it to be spent by Trump.

The administration is spending as much as possible from the American Rescue Plan, the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law, the CHIPS and Science Act and the Inflation Reduction Act.

The four laws provide more than $4 trillion in investments, spending and tax credits.

The White House said the administration has already awarded 98% of funding available. But there are billions of dollars that are budgeted for the next couple of fiscal years: $288 billion in infrastructure funding that won't be available until Fiscal Year 2025; $14.8 billion for the Inflation Reduction Act after Fiscal Year 2025; about $10 billion CHIPS funding for Fiscal Years 2025 and 2026.

While Biden can't spend that future money, he can try to allocate where the money should go, locking in the funds for his initiatives and tying Trump's hands when it comes to spending it.

Trump pledged in September to rescind any 'unspent' funds under the Inflation Reduction Act – that law that provided billions to Biden's climate-friendly initiatives.

The president-elect has called those initiatives a 'waste of money.'

But if Biden can obligate the funds that would offer them some legal protection against an effort by Trump to claw them back.

RUSHING THROUGH RULES AND CONFIRMATIONS

President Biden has confirmed 235 federal judges over the course of his presidency, which is one more than the 234 confirmed by Trump in his first administration.

Biden celebrated his accomplishment earlier this month.

'Together, these judges are going to hear cases on issues, ruling on from everything from whether Americans can cast their ballot, I mean literally how they can cast their ballot, when it will be counted,' he said. 

'Whether workers can unionize — I thought we settled that in 1934 — and make a living wage for their families; whether their children can breathe clean air and drink clean water.'

His administration is also working on pushing through new federal rules, including ones that would limit junk fees; cap bank overcharge fees; and use tax credits to promote clean energy use.

Republicans argue such rules expand the reach of government and are an overreach of federal power.

Opponents of the rules are working on ways to unwind them once Republicans take control of the House, Senate and White House.

And some groups, including the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, have spoken with the Department of Government Efficiency, or DOGE, the Elon Musk-backed effort will review federal spending and regulation, the Washington Post reported. They hope Musk's endeavors results in wide-scale deregulation.

USING FEDERAL LAW TO HIS ADVANTAGE

Many of the rules are being made in a way that it would take an act of Congress or a new rule to undo them.

One of those Biden rules is tied to federal workers.

Trump wants to have the power to easily fire federal workers, which has brought fears he will fire career employees who have different political ideologies.

During the final weeks of his first term in 2020, Trump issued an executive order creating a new class of federal workers known as Schedule F.

These staffers would be exempt from the country's traditional merit-based civil service program. And opponents argued it was an attempt to hire and fire people based on their political loyalty.

Biden, when he came into office in January 2021, rescinded that order.

He then took it one step further last spring, when he issued a new rule that strengthens existing rights for career federal workers by making it clear that civil service protections cannot be taken away from employees unless they give them up voluntarily.

In other words, it makes it nearly impossible for Trump to classify current federal employees under a Schedule F type order.

A senior Biden administration official told CNN that the rule could not easily be rolled back in a second Trump term. Trump has repeatedly promised he would reinstate Schedule F executive order on day one.

'An executive order would not have impact with this regulation in place,' the senior Biden official said. 

'A future administration would have to go through a new regulatory process, which would also entail like explaining specifically through that rulemaking process why a different rule is better than the existing regulations that OPM (the Office of Personnel Management) finalized and are announced … and how that new approach was consistent with the law.'

Trump vilified some career officials as the 'deep state' during his term and sought to get rid of them.

He does have options, but they are time consuming.

When Trump comes into office, Republicans will control Congress and could pass the legislation that Trump would then sign into law to undo Biden's work.

Alternatively, Trump can issue new rules but those have to go through a long bureaucratic process, which includes a public comment period, before they become law.

OFFSHORE DRILLING

Biden used the 1953 Outer Continental Shelf Lands Act to protect 625 million acres around the continental U.S. from offshore drilling.

His decision to use the law instead of executive action is telling.

The 1953 law gives the president the power to withdraw federal waters from future oil and gas leasing.

And, in 2019, U.S. District Judge Sharon Gleason ruled those presidential directives can't be undone without an act of Congress.

Trump was in his first term at the time of the lawsuit and appealed the decision. But the government dropped the appeal after Biden took office so the Supreme Court has never weighed in.

The president-elect has vowed to overturn the decision – no matter how he has to do it. The courts are one option. Another is to have Congress repeal Biden's move.

'We'll put it back,' Trump told reporters at his Mar-a-Lago resort last week. 'I'm going to put it back on day one. I'm going to have it revoked on day one.'

'That's like the whole ocean,' he said. 'They try to be sneaky.'

UKRAINE FUNDING

Biden's administration is giving another $500 million in security aid to bolster Ukraine's military amid uncertainty about Trump's level of support for the war-torn nation.

Overall, the administration has given Kyiv $65 billion in security assistance. And now Biden is pushing to get every last dollar and cent out the door before Trump enters the Oval Office.

Trump has said he's ready to meet with Russian President Vladimir Putin to work on a deal to end the war. But Ukraine and its allies fear any negotiation with Moscow would include attempts by Putin to take Ukrainian territory.

There is about $4 billion left in appropriated funding for Ukraine left, an amount the administration is expected to expend. A December package provided $1.25 billion, in yet another effort to bolster Ukraine amid its uncertain future.