As a reality TV host, Donald Trump became famous for his catchphrase: “You’re fired!” On Monday, the U.S. Supreme Court gave him – and all future presidents – the power to fire the heads of independent agencies and commissions, overturning 90 years of judicial precedent limiting executive power.
While Trump celebrated the Truth Social decision as a “big victory,” labor advocates, unions and consumer rights groups criticized the Supreme Court’s Trump v. Slaughter decision and warned of long-term consequences for U.S. democracy. Rebecca Slaughter, the federal trade commissioner who was fired last March, said during a news conference that she was “deeply disappointed by today’s decision.”
“No sugarcoating the carnage. This is a hugely important ruling (much more important than the other three decisions passed today). It is a huge victory for Trump/the executive branch. And it will have huge implications for the functioning of government long after Trump is gone,” wrote Stephen Vladeck, a law professor at Georgetown.
Trump has already fired several independent agency executives during his second term. He fired National Labor Relations Board member Gwynne Wilcox, the first black woman to serve on the agency’s board of directors; Susan Tsui Grundmann, one of three board members of the Federal Labor Relations Administration (FLRA); Erica McEntarfer, Commissioner, Bureau of Labor Statistics; and Deirdre Hamilton, member of the National Mediation Council.
But it was Slaughter’s firing that led to the Supreme Court’s decision. In her statement, Slaughter said she was fired “because I have a voice. And he (Trump) is afraid of what I will say to the American people.”
Trump also fired another Democratic FTC commissioner, Alvaro Bedoya.
No reasons were given to justify the dismissals, other than to note that “their continued employment with the Federal Trade Commission is not consistent with the (Trump) Administration’s priorities.”
The ruling overturned Humphrey’s “Executioner” ruling of 1935, which held that the U.S. Constitution did not grant the president an “unfettered power of removal” and protected independent agency employees from potential political attacks by the president. The case was sparked by Franklin Roosevelt’s attempt to fire William Humphrey, the Republican commissioner of the Federal Trade Commission.
“As Justice Sotomayor acknowledged in his dissent, today’s decision abandons nearly a century of settled constitutional understanding and replaces it with a loyalty test,” said Gary DiBianco, co-founder of the charitable litigation corps Lawyers for Good Government.
The decision would give Trump and any future president much more control over independent agencies.
“In short, our authoritarian president has just been handed the keys to becoming even more authoritarian, and the long-term consequences will undoubtedly be catastrophic,” Rachel Rossi, president of the Alliance for Justice, a progressive justice advocacy group, said in a statement about the decision.
“This ruling further undermines barriers against corruption and unfair interference by President Trump, putting millions of Americans at risk,” said Michael Sozan, a senior fellow at the Center for American Progress. “This regulation, which overturns nearly a century of well-established law, allows the President to exert undue political pressure on government agencies that Congress intended to insulate from such coercion.”
“This decision effectively prioritizes the president’s policy preferences over ensuring that independent agencies can carry out their enforcement and regulatory responsibilities in accordance with the law and act with integrity,” said Jocelyn Fry of the National Partnership for Women and Families.
In a separate ruling, the Supreme Court ruled against Trump’s firing of Federal Reserve board member Lisa Cook last August. But the Supreme Court has made clear that the Fed will be treated differently from other government agencies.
Justice Sonia Sotomayor called Slaughter’s decision “flagrantly wrong,” arguing that the majority violated settled constitutional law by passing a ruling that she wrote “promises only to cause chaos.”
“Today, the Court rejects that democratic regime in favor of a regime that distorts the structure of government to conform to the majority’s theory of unitary, total executive control. The result is a President with far more power than ever before,” she wrote.
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