Trump announces new impeachment legal team

The nomination of Alejandro Mayorkas to lead the Homeland Security Department has cleared a procedural hurdle in the Senate and is now expected to move forward to a final vote on Monday evening.

Following Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer’s motion to limit debate on the nomination -- the first time Schumer's had to use the tool to bypass GOP efforts to slow down a Biden confirmation -- the vote will go forward with 51 votes needed to confirm, according to a senior Democratic aide.

Mayorkas has received a wide swath of support from current and former law enforcement officials, including members of the largest federal law enforcement officer’s union, the Border Patrol union -- a bipartisan group of four former secretaries and police chiefs across the country. The support came after a group of Republicans on the Senate Judiciary Committee called on committee Chair Sen. Dick Durbin, D-Ill., to hold an additional hearing to consider Mayorkas.

He would be the first Latino and first immigrant to serve as Homeland Security secretary, if confirmed.

-ABC News' Quinn Owen and Allison Pecorin

Biden has signed two executive actions -- one aimed at expanding enrollment for the Affordable Care Act amid the coronavirus pandemic and another that addresses reproductive health.

"It's been a busy week, and I've signed executive orders tackling COVID-19, the economic and climate crises, as well as advancing racial equity. But today, we're about to sign two executive orders that are, basically the best way to describe them, to undo the damage Trump has done," he said from the Oval Office Thursday.

Biden signed one executive order that will open a three-month enrollment period from Feb. 15 to May 15, allowing more Americans to sign up for health care as COVID-19 continues to engulf the country.

The Biden administration expects "most or all" of the 13 states that operate their own health insurance marketplaces to also open up enrollment at the same time it opens up the federal health insurance marketplace for a special enrollment period, a White House official said Thursday morning.

"The first one I'm going to be signing here is to strengthen Medicaid and the Affordable Care Act. And of all times that we need to reinstate access to, affordability of, and extent of access to Medicaid, is now, in the middle of this COVID crisis," Biden said, stressing he wasn't initiating any new laws with his actions but strengthening provisions Trump had weakened.

He then addressed reproductive health in a presidential memorandum which rescinds the Mexico City Policy, often referred to as the "global gag rule," which was expanded under former President Donald Trump and blocks U.S. funding to international nonprofits that provide counseling or referrals for abortion, reviews Title X funding on abortion and removes the country's endorsement of the Geneva Consensus, a nonbinding declaration signed by countries opposed to abortion and former Secretary of State Mike Pompeo in 2020.

"The second order I'm signing relates to protecting women's health at home and abroad, and it reinstates the changes that were made to Title X and other things making it hard for women to have access to affordable health care as it relates to their reproductive rights," he said, and signed the second action.

Biden's pick for secretary of housing and urban development, Rep. Marcia Fudge, D.-Ohio, and his choice to lead the Council of Economic Advisers, Cecilia Rouse, testified before Senate Committee on Banking, Housing and Urban Development for a joint confirmation hearing Thursday morning.

Fudge emphasized her commitment to expanding accessible housing for Americans, if confirmed, and highlighted the housing crisis created by the COVID-19 pandemic.

"We need policies and programs that can adapt to meet your unique housing challenges, and I would very much like to work with each of you to find the right answers for your states," Fudge said. "It bears mentioning, particularly in this moment of crisis that HUD, perhaps more than any other department, exists to serve the most vulnerable people in America. That mandate matters a great deal to me."

She faced scrutiny from some Republican senators about past statements and tweets critical of the GOP, but Fudge pushed back and maintained that she would commit to working with Republicans, as she said she's done in the House.

Rouse, who Biden nominated to lead the Council of Economic Advisers, also discussed her commitment to bolstering the American economy.

"We must take action to shepherd our nation's economy back onto solid footing," Rouse said. "But as deeply distressing as this pandemic and economic fallout have been, it is also an opportunity to rebuild the economy better than it was before, making it work for everyone by increasing the availability of fulfilling jobs and leaving no one vulnerable to falling through the cracks."

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi told reporters Thursday that she is concerned about threats against members of Congress in the wake of the Capitol attack and that the "enemy is within the House of Representatives."

"We will probably need a supplemental for more security for members when the enemy is within the House of Representatives," Pelosi said, asked about what's being done to help members feel safe and about a demand by more than 30 House members to use their congressional allowances for personal safety in their home districts.

When asked to expand on what she meant by "enemy within" she responded, "We have members of Congress who want to bring guns on the floor and have threatened violence on other members of Congress." 

Her comments come after some Republicans have tried, in recent days, to bring their guns on the House floor, despite guns being forbidden there and the addition of a metal detector at the chamber door.

-ABC News' Mariam Khan