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The Supreme Court's 6-3 decision Monday giving President Donald Trump authority to remove Federal Trade Commission Commissioner Rebecca Slaughter at will did more than overturn nearly 90 years of precedent — Justice Neil Gorsuch used a concurring opinion to sketch a constitutional roadmap for dismantling the broader administrative state, raising immediate questions about the long-term structural status of agencies including the Securities and Exchange Commission, the Federal Communications Commission, the National Labor Relations Board, and even the Federal Reserve.
Roberts Rewrites the Removal Rule Chief Justice John Roberts wrote for the majority, holding that the FTC "unquestionably exercises executive power" and therefore its commissioners must be accountable to the president.
The ruling overturns the core of Humphrey's Executor, the nearly 90-year-old precedent that had shielded independent agency officials from at-will dismissal.
Roberts confined the holding narrowly to presidential removal authority, explicitly leaving open questions about agencies such as the Federal Reserve.
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