Federal Agencies May Soon Lose Power to Regulate Independently of Trump’s Will |
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The U.S. Supreme Court heard arguments this month in a case that could dramatically strengthen presidential authority over federal regulatory agencies for the decades to come.
The case, Trump v. Slaughter, grew out of President Donald Trump’s firing of a Federal Trade Commission (FTC) board member, Rebecca Slaughter, a Democrat — whom Trump himself had appointed during his first term in office — without cause. Slaughter sued, arguing that Congress had set up the FTC to be independent from presidential pressure, and that Trump was exceeding his authority by firing her. For months, the case has been wending its way through the court system, and a decision in the case is not likely to come down until June or July.
Slaughter is one of five FTC commissioners who are each appointed to seven-year terms. Historically, the FTC, established by President Woodrow Wilson in 1914, has had a balance of Democratic and Republican commissioners and has aimed to regulate trade, prevent unfair business practices, and enforce antitrust legislation, in a generally evenhanded and non-partisan manner. In March, Trump summarily fired Slaughter and the other Democrat on the commission, saying in a terse email that their ongoing employment was “inconsistent with the Administration’s priorities.”
Several top personnel at other agencies whom Trump had also targeted for political reasons initiated their own lawsuits against the president. Lower courts pushed back against these firings; but in May the Supreme Court allowed the firings to go into temporary effect while the court debated the merits of the cases. Upon hearing Slaughter’s case, many of the justices, three of whom owe their jobs to Trump, seem to have concluded that the president ought to have the authority to fire, on a whim, any commissioner he chooses. Pair this with their earlier ruling essentially giving the commander-in-chief immunity for any actions carried out in an “official capacity” — no matter how criminal they might be in other circumstances — and the Supreme Court looks to be setting the stage, with a ruling........