Trump is using power like no one before him.

In just ten weeks in office, Donald Trump has imposed his will on those he perceives as adversaries in business, politics, the media, and among allies, wielding power in ways that no other American president in modern history has even attempted.

His administration has sought the arrest and deportation of student protesters, cut off federal funding to colleges, expelled law firms affiliated with his political opponents, threatened judges, and attempted to pressure journalists. At the same time, Trump has drastically reduced the federal administration and removed employees who might stand in his way.

At the heart of Trump's efforts is the use of executive orders in policymaking to target opponents in an unprecedented way, according to Reuters. He has not hesitated to use lawsuits, public threats and the power of the federal budget to force institutions to obey him.

“What ties all of these moves together is Trump’s desire to eliminate every possible source of resistance to the MAGA agenda and his personal power,” Peter Shane, a law professor at New York University, told Reuters.

Some targets have rushed to appease the president, some have opposed him, and many are still trying to figure out how to respond. Many of Trump's moves are being challenged in the courts, where some judges have tried to slow him down.

The astonishing speed and scope of the Republican president's moves caught Democrats, public sector unions, corporate executives, and the legal profession off guard.

Trump's supporters claim that he is merely using all the mechanisms of the presidency to achieve the goals he set as a candidate.

“He has clearly drawn broad lines of attack — whether it’s against people he believes have tried to destroy him personally, or against those he believes have tried to destroy Western civilization,” said Republican strategist Scott Jennings, a longtime adviser to Senator Mitch McConnell. “Everything he said he would do during the campaign, he is now doing.”

Trump's goals are not just political, the British agency says, adding that his moves show that he wants to reorganize American society with an all-powerful executive at the top, where financial, political and cultural institutions bear his stamp, and opposition is either appropriated or suppressed. With a submissive Congress controlled by his party and a US Supreme Court dominated by conservative justices, Trump operates with fewer constraints than any of his modern predecessors.

Trump tries to contain and win over his opponents almost daily, relying on the formidable power of the law enforcement institutions and regulatory bodies under his command. He has often succeeded.

He has managed to extract concessions from several of his targets, including the prestigious Columbia University, powerful law firms, and corporate giants like Meta and Disney. All have opted to make deals with the White House rather than withstand pressure, thereby partially giving up their independence and, some say, setting damaging precedents.

Others are taking preemptive measures to avoid Trump's wrath. More than 20 of the largest U.S. companies and financial firms, including Goldman Sachs, Google and PepsiCo, have rolled back diversity programs that drew Trump's ire.

Three law firms have reached agreements with the administration to avoid risking their lawyers losing security clearances, access to government buildings, and perhaps clients, while three other firms targeted by Trump's executive orders have filed lawsuits in response.

Trump has also used executive orders as a tool to reshuffle the government - he has deported alleged Venezuelan gang members with minimal legal process and imposed tariffs on US trading partners.

He sued American media corporations and silenced the Voice of America, took control of the Kennedy Center, one of the leading arts institutions, and tried to impose restrictions on the work of the Smithsonian Institution, whose mission is to record history.

His administration has detained student protesters whose political views it considers a threat to the country.

Trump has forced a deal on the Ukrainian leadership for mineral rights, with a tacit threat to end US support for Kiev in its war against Russia. He has threatened ally Denmark to try to take control of Greenland, talked about annexing Canada, and threatened to take back the Panama Canal from its host country.

Precision strikes

Mark Zaid, a Washington attorney who represents whistleblowers against the federal government and whose security clearance was personally revoked by Trump, says the president's behavior is unlike anything he has seen in his 30-year career.

"The executive orders were never intended to target individuals or non-governmental actors for the purpose of retaliation or revenge," Zeid told Reuters.

The White House and Trump's allies deny that the president is acting out of revenge.

A White House spokesman said more traditional approaches had failed to bring about substantive change.

“Unorthodoxy is exactly what the American people chose when they elected President Trump,” said White House spokesman Harrison Fields. “The president is determined to dismantle entrenched bureaucracy.”

During his first term, from 2017 to 2021, Trump was limited by numerous factors: the federal investigation into Russian election interference, the lack of experience of his aides, and stronger resistance from Democrats in Congress.

With those obstacles now gone, an emboldened Trump demonstrated at the start of his second term that he had learned how to fully utilize the resources at his disposal to achieve his goals.

“This time he really knows how to pull the levers of power, much better than last time,” said Rina Sha, a Republican consultant.

Claire Wofford, a political science professor at the College of Charleston, argues that Trump is using executive orders not only to pursue a political agenda, but also to send messages to his political base - such as his attempt to limit birthright citizenship - and to test the limits of his power, such as invoking an 18th-century law that declared some migrants "enemy aliens."

"What strikes me most at this point is how strategically Trump is thinking, but in new ways," Wofford said.

Finance and prosecution

In cases like the one with Columbia University, Trump has used the federal budget as a weapon, assuming that his targets have financial interests that make them vulnerable to coercion.

In other cases, he used the courts, forcing companies like Disney and Meta into favorable settlements after filing lawsuits against them.

CBS News, another target of Trump's lawsuit, is under pressure to reach a settlement because its parent company, Paramount, is interested in getting the administration to approve a proposed merger with Skydance Media.

But not all institutions gave in.

Many of Trump's policies, particularly those related to government cuts, remain blocked in federal courts. In the past two weeks alone, judges have ruled against Trump on issues such as his deportation policies, attacks on law firms, and plans to dismantle government agencies.

In response, Trump and his allies have called for the impeachment of judges who rule against his administration, prompting rare public criticism of Supreme Court Chief Justice John Roberts.

Walter Olson, a senior fellow at the libertarian CATO Institute, told Reuters that Trump's attacks on law firms and courts are unprecedented and reminiscent of government behavior in authoritarian regimes.

“Clipping the wings of lawyers and courts,” Olson said, “is the behavior of an autocrat.”