We see untrammelled power with fawning courtiers. George Washington would have recognised the new system at the White House

Donald Trump’s triumphal return to the White House was American political theatre on steroids. This was, of course, exactly the returning president’s intention. “Shock and awe” was the en vogue phrase in the Trump camp to describe it, as the president sought to obliterate the Biden era in a blizzard of executive presidential orders and day-one Maga movement payoffs.

Trump’s second inauguration was exceptionally well worked. Where or whether it all lands in the form of delivered policy is a different issue. To some, it may feel petty to note that the last US “shock and awe” exercise – the Iraq invasion of 2003 – also generated a feast of indelible images of American power. But that one certainly did not end well.

From LNG to drilling in Alaska, here’s everything you need to know about Trump’s energy and climate executive orders

Through a flurry of executive orders, a newly inaugurated Donald Trump has made clear his support for the ascendancy of fossil fuels, the dismantling of support for cleaner energy and the United States’ exit from the fight to contain the escalating climate crisis.

“We will drill, baby, drill,” the president said in his inaugural address on Monday. “We have something that no other manufacturing nation will ever have – the largest amount of oil and gas of any country on Earth, and we are going to use it. We’re going to use it.”

If criminal charges were meant to deter acts of violence, the pardons of over 1,500 people do the opposite, say experts

Donald Trump spent the four years after the January 6 insurrection attempting to rewrite the violence and chaos he inspired as his supporters stormed the US Capitol.

On the first day of his second term as president, he took the rewriting to its final step by issuing pardons and reducing sentences for those involved in the insurrection, including the leaders of far-right militias and those who battled with police that day.

People worldwide take to the streets after Donald Trump was sworn in as US president on Monday

A look at the events and festivities in Washington as Donald Trump and JD Vance are sworn into office