Supreme Court Called Back To Washington, D.C. – Issue Emergency 6-3 Ruling In Case Involving President Donald Tru…

The ruling reinforces the Trump administration’s aggressive push to dismantle removal protections for members of independent agencies, challenging a 90-year-old Supreme Court precedent that allowed Congress to create such safeguards. The CPSC commissioners, appointed by former President Joe Biden, were dismissed earlier this year. Trump offered no justification for their removal, even though federal law grants independent agency officials “for-cause” removal protections.

Under federal law, CPSC commissioners can only be removed by the president for “neglect of duty or malfeasance in office.” Similar protections apply to a few other federal agencies and are ostensibly designed to shield them from direct political influence by the White House.

The commissioners, represented by the consumer advocacy group Public Citizen, had urged the justices to avoid involvement in the case. Solicitor General D. John Sauer argued that lower courts continue to defy the Supreme Court’s direction and urged the justices to bypass the lower courts entirely and take up the CPSC case directly on their regular docket.