Supreme Court Delivers Trump Win On Who He Can Fire

The U.S. Supreme Court’s conservative majority on Monday overturned a decades-old legal precedent that prevented the president from removing heads of independent agencies. 

In a 6-3 ruling, authored by Chief Justice John Roberts, the court allowed President Donald Trump to fire Federal Trade Commissioner Rebecca Slaughter. The ruling effectively overturns Humphrey’s Executor v. United States, a landmark 1935 Supreme Court decision that held Congress may limit the president’s removal power by requiring that members of independent agencies be removable only for cause.

“Although it is up to the Senate to decide whether to confirm those with whom the President would prefer to work, neither Congress nor the courts may saddle him with those with whom he cannot work. Subordinates who exercise the President’s power are subject to removal by him,” Roberts wrote for the court. 

“Then, and only then, can they remain accountable to the President, and the President to the people,” he added. 

The decision represents a significant victory for the president and proponents of the unitary executive theory, strengthening the legal argument that the Constitution gives the president near-total control over the executive branch.

President Trump celebrated the ruling on Truth Social. 

“BIG WIN just moments ago at the Supreme Court, in the Slaughter Case, confirming Presidential Power in our Country to remove Executive Branch Officers and Agency Appointees, or Representatives, under Article II. This Decision was long sought by United States Presidents, dating all the way back to the 1930s,” Trump said. 

“It is such an Honor to be the sitting President who won this Historic and Unprecedented Ruling, one of the most important ever given with respect to Presidential Powers,” he added. 

Liberal justices Sonia Sotomayor, Elena Kagan, and Ketanji Brown Jackson dissented. 

“Today, the Court discards that democratic regime in favor of one that distorts the structure of Government to fit the majority’s theory of unitary, total executive control,” Sotomayor wrote. “The result is a President who emerges with far greater power than ever before. It is a power, however, that neither the People, nor Congress, nor the Constitution bestowed upon him.” 

The controversy erupted in March 2025, when Trump fired Rebecca Slaughter, whom he originally nominated to the Federal Trade Commission in 2018. Then-President Joe Biden renominated her in 2023 for a second term set to run through 2029.

In an email notifying Slaughter of her termination, Trump said her continued service would be “inconsistent with [the] Administration’s priorities,” according to SCOTUSblog. 

At the same time, Trump also fired Democratic appointee Alvaro Bedoya. Bedoya initially joined Slaughter’s legal challenge but later resigned from the commission, citing financial struggles.

Last July, lower courts blocked Trump’s attempt to remove Slaughter, finding he had failed to comply with the removal protections set out in federal law. In a 2-1 decision, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit upheld the ruling, and the administration appealed to the Supreme Court, where it prevailed today.

The high court appears to be threading the needle between expanding the president’s firing power and preserving limits for other government agencies. On Monday, a divided 5-4 court refused to allow President Trump to fire Federal Reserve Governor Lisa Cook over mortgage fraud allegations.