Know about the two departments that Trump announced in his inaugural speech

Donald Trump's inauguration completes his triumphant comeback after surviving two impeachment trials, a felony conviction, two assassination attempts and an indictment for attempting to overturn his 2020 election loss.

During his inauguration speech, US President Donald Trump announced the establishment of an external revenue service to collect tariffs from foreign countries exporting goods to America.

“I will immediately begin the overhaul of our trade system to protect American workers and families. Instead of taxing our citizens to enrich other countries, we will tariff and tax foreign countries to enrich our citizens,” Trump said. “For this purpose, we are establishing the external revenue service to collect all tariffs, duties, and revenues. It will be massive amounts of money pouring into our treasury, coming from foreign sources. The American dream will soon be back and thriving like never before, to restore competence and effectiveness to our federal government,” he added.

This announcement follows Trump’s threat last month to impose 100 per cent tariffs on Brazil, Russia, India, China, and South Africa (the BRICS nations) if they create a new BRICS currency or back any other currency to replace the US dollar as the world’s reserve currency.

The creation of a new agency requires an act of Congress, and Republicans hold the majority of both the House and the Senate.

Trump, who has vowed to shrink the size of government, would be creating a new agency to do functions already handled by existing agencies, including the Commerce Department and the Customs and Border Patrol, which collect duties and revenues from other nations.

The president-elect has tapped two business titans to lead his Department of Government Efficiency, or DOGE, a nongovernmental task force assigned to find ways to fire federal workers, cut programmes and slash federal regulations, all part of what he calls his “Save America” agenda for a second term in the White House.

Billionaire Elon Musk and fellow entrepreneur Vivek Ramaswamy are leading the DOGE's ambitious efforts to reduce the size and scope of the federal government.

Tariffs, with the threat of a potential 25 per cent levy on all goods from allies like Canada and Mexico and 60 per cent on goods from China, have become a benchmark of Trump's economic agenda as he heads into his second term.

Economists have said the cost of the tariffs will be passed on to consumers, and are generally skeptical of them, considering them a mostly inefficient way for governments to raise money and promote prosperity.

Democratic lawmakers were quick to criticize the External Revenue Service plan.

“No amount of silly rebranding will hide the fact that Trump is planning a multi-trillion-dollar tax hike on American families and small businesses to pay for another round of tax handouts to the rich," Oregon Sen. Ron Wyden, the top Democrat on the Senate Finance Committee, said in a statement.

(With inputs from agencies)