President Trump signaled he'd remake American institutions with executive orders, overhauling the federal government, changes to foreign aid and threatening tariffs against Mexico and Canada, set to begin next month.

Senior correspondent Brenda Flanagan takes a deeper look at what it all means for New Jersey residents and the president's America First priorities.

I was saved by God to make America great again.

The 47th president wasted no time launching an unprecedented barrage of executive orders on day one.

Deployed with tactical precision, most notably on immigration.

New Jersey immigrant rights groups circle the wagons as Donald Trump declared a national emergency at the southern border and signed a directive to end birthright citizenship that's enshrined in the Constitution's 14th Amendment.

All illegal entry will immediately be halted, and we will begin the process of returning millions and millions of criminal aliens back to the places from which they came.

They are expanding the authority of CBP and Ice and the National Guard in order to go out racially profiled black and brown people and attempt to indefinitely detain them.

New Jersey advocates like Make the Road urged lawmakers here to pass the Immigrant Trust Act that would help undocumented residents access support without fear of deportation.

They vowed resistance.

We know he's going to make every effort to harm our communities, and supercharge all of the hateful policies of his first term of Trump 1.0.

An estimated 470,000 undocumented immigrants call new Jersey home, and a state directive bars law enforcement from collaborating with federal raids targeting people simply because they're undocumented.

I'm sure breaking into somebody's home has committed no crime, ripping their American born children away from them so that they can send those American kids back to a country they had never been to.

That's not what law enforcement signed up to do.

Attorney General Matt Platkin today announced New Jersey's leading 17 other states in a lawsuit to block Trump's pledge to end children's birthright citizenship, arguing those stripped of citizenship will be grievously harmed, as would states that lose federal aid, noting new Jersey will still care for these children, but it will bear the full cost of doing so.

This is an extreme and unprecedented act, and this executive order is an assault on the rule of law.

It attacks a right that is core to our nation's earliest days.

The ACLU also challenged Trump's order on birthright citizenship with a lawsuit filed in New Hampshire, new Jersey and the people of the United States will not be intimidated by authoritarianism.

What we're seeing is a worldview from the Trump administration that is premised on hate.

It's premised on division and sowing fear and, in the populace.

Trump, however, does have the legal power to grant sweeping clemency to more than 1500 January 6th rioters who violently attack the U.S. Capitol.

Those pardoned include the man convicted of assaulting fallen new Jersey native, Capitol Police officer Brian Sicknick.

Sicknick's brother, Craig, told NJ Advance Media.

I feel that my brother died in vain.

As far as I'm concerned, the U.S. just installed its first dictator.

January 6th also involved a lot of violence.

Violence against law enforcement officers matters which I believe we have a tradition of taking very seriously.

Rutgers law professor Ron Chen says accepting the pardon actually cements the participants guilt.

There are old Supreme Court cases that say then they are acknowledging their guilt of the original crimes, and they're just accepting forgiveness for that crime.

Now, I have a feeling that very few of them will actually acknowledge of that.

Is this the spirit intended?

The issue by the pardon or by the acceptance in the stack of executive orders, also included several aimed at reversing Biden administration efforts to address climate change.

That is why today I will also declare a national energy emergency.

We will drill, baby drill.

Biden banned offshore drilling by executive order, but Trump rescinded those restrictions.

He also temporarily barred the sale of new offshore wind leases.

But Jersey's already got three pending wind energy projects.

However, it puts Governor Murphy in an awkward spot as a clean energy champion.

Who's also asking for Trump's help to fight congestion pricing?

Bottom line we've said unequivocally that if our values or innocent individuals are attacked without cause.

We're going to stand up and stand up strongly, he indicated.

Dealing with the new administration will be a balancing act that they've done before.

I'm Brenda Flanagan, NJ Spotlight News.