On March 18, President Trump fired the two Democratic commissioners of the Federal Trade Commission (FTC). The removals of Alvaro Bedoya and Rebecca Kelly Slaughter are the latest in a series of executive actions that will limit the agency’s independence.
They also present a direct challenge to Humphrey’s Executor v. United States, the Supreme Court’s 1935 decision holding that Congress may limit the president’s authority to remove members of the FTC without good cause. Both Slaughter and Bedoya stated that they had been “illegally fired.” If the commissioners challenge their terminations, the Supreme Court may be forced to confront the question of whether Humphrey’s Executor should be overruled—an issue the Court has avoided in several recent cases that significantly limited the decision’s application to other agencies, without overruling it. Continue Reading Trump Fires Democratic FTC Commissioners, Setting Up a Direct Challenge to Humphrey’s Executor