SCOTUS Weighs Trump’s Firing Power

“You’re fired!” is one of the most famous lines from reality television, originating with President Donald Trump’s former show, “The Apprentice.” But now that he’s in the White House, multiple lawsuits have prompted the Supreme Court to decide who to, and when, he can say that line within the federal bureaucracy.

Trump attempted to fire Rebecca Slaughter, a member of the Federal Trade Commission (FTC), earlier this year but ran up against Congressional limits on his reasons for doing so. Arguing before the Supreme Court on Dec. 8, U.S. Solicitor General D. John Sauer argued that those limits intruded on Trump’s power over the executive branch. 

The eventual decision, as the justices indicated, could have far-reaching implications for multiple agencies and the nation’s separation of powers. While the court has offered tentative rulings on firings from other agencies under Trump, it has yet to give a final decision. 

Slaughter’s case is expected to change that and could lead the Supreme Court to overturn a 90-year-old precedent on the issue. 

A unanimous Supreme Court held in 1935 that Congress could restrict the president’s ability to remove FTC commissioners because they exercised “quasi-legislative” or “quasi-judicial” power rather than merely executive power. That case, known as Humphrey’s Executor v. United States, has been cited by lower courts in their rulings against Trump’s firings of Slaughter and other agency officials.

Sauer told the justices that precedent should be overruled. The administration has also suggested that the decision in Humphrey’s Executor was outdated because the FTC exercised considerably more executive power than it had in 1935.

Two of the swing votes on the court, Chief Justice John Roberts and Justice Amy Coney Barrett, seemed somewhat sympathetic to these arguments. Roberts, for example, said that the court’s decision in a 2020 case—Seila Law v. Consumer Financial Protection Bureau—had clarified that Humphrey’s Executor was a “dried husk of whatever people used to think it was.”

Barrett said the court had seen an “eroding of Humphrey’s Executor over the years” and raised a point the Trump administration had made about the FTC engaging with foreign nations.

The three liberal justices were more critical of Sauer’s position, suggesting that the administration was undermining the structure of the federal government and potentially usurping power from Congress.

Justice Sonia Sotomayor told Sauer that “you’re asking us to destroy the structure of government and to take away from Congress its ability to protect its idea that … the government is better structured with some agencies that are independent.”

On the other end of the spectrum, Justice Neil Gorsuch seemed ready to rein in the legislative branch. In an exchange with Sauer, he suggested that the court should not only disallow “quasi-legislative” powers within agencies, but limit how Congress can delegate its authority to executive entities.

Whatever their decision, Justice Elena Kagan argued it could impact other agency officials and lower-level employees as well. The Supreme Court is already set to hear oral argument in January over a Federal Reserve firing, and has refrained from ruling on a copyright official’s firing as it considers Slaughter’s case.

—Sam Dorman

BOOKMARKS

Donald Trump unveiled a $12 billion economic package on Monday to assist farmers laboring to export goods in the face of Chinese tariffs. Up to $11 billion of the aid funds will be used for one-time bridge payments to help farmers weather the storm of the trade war.  

The U.S. Department of Homeland Security said on Dec. 8 that Illinois has released nearly 1,800 criminal illegal aliens this year, rather than honoring federal requests to detain them for deportation. Gov. JB Pritzker previously said he wanted criminals deported, but in January, he told law enforcement agents not to honor holding requests from immigration authorities.  

Alina Habba has stepped down from her position as Acting U.S. Attorney for New Jersey, following a federal court ruling that said she was appointed illegally. “This decision will not weaken the Justice Department, and it will not weaken me,” she said in a post on X. 

Gas prices have dipped to their lowest level since May 2021, according to GasBuddy, which tracks those prices nationwide. ”Barring any major disruptions, prices are likely to stay relatively low into the New Year,” GasBuddy analyst Patrick De Haan said on X. 

The Supreme Court is scrutinizing Trump’s tariffs, but what happens if they are declared illegal? Read Tom Ozimek’s latest report to learn about the president’s backup strategy.

—Stacy Robinson