And, indeed, it could be argued that past administrations have done that. Congressional deadlock has been an issue in the US for quite some time, and the administration has to go on anyway. Off the top of my head, I am reminded of Obama essentially ceding control of marijuana policy to the states by making it clear to the ATF that prosecuting federal possession crime in states that had legalized the drug was legal, within their authority... And a short path to locking in a desk job at their current level indefinitely.

But when previous administrations did this, they (usually, as far as I know) consulted with domain experts on predictable consequences and set timelines to factor that in. This administration seems to have "effective immediately" as the only timeframe it's aware of.

Nah, that's unfair! "Two weeks" seems to be a very popular timeframe as well.