No Result
View All Result
SUBMIT YOUR ARTICLES
  • Login
Wednesday, October 22, 2025
TheAdviserMagazine.com
  • Home
  • Financial Planning
    • Financial Planning
    • Personal Finance
  • Market Research
    • Business
    • Investing
    • Money
    • Economy
    • Markets
    • Stocks
    • Trading
  • 401k Plans
  • College
  • IRS & Taxes
  • Estate Plans
  • Social Security
  • Medicare
  • Legal
  • Home
  • Financial Planning
    • Financial Planning
    • Personal Finance
  • Market Research
    • Business
    • Investing
    • Money
    • Economy
    • Markets
    • Stocks
    • Trading
  • 401k Plans
  • College
  • IRS & Taxes
  • Estate Plans
  • Social Security
  • Medicare
  • Legal
No Result
View All Result
TheAdviserMagazine.com
No Result
View All Result
Home Legal

Supreme Court allows Trump to remove agency heads without cause for now

by TheAdviserMagazine
5 months ago
in Legal
Reading Time: 4 mins read
A A
Supreme Court allows Trump to remove agency heads without cause for now
Share on FacebookShare on TwitterShare on LInkedIn


The Supreme Court on Thursday granted the Trump administration’s request to pause orders by federal judges that required government officials to allow board members at two independent federal agencies to stay in office after President Donald Trump tried to fire them. Chief Justice John Roberts had already issued an administrative stay, which temporarily put those orders on hold to give the justices time to consider the government’s request, so Thursday’s order extends that hold while the litigation continues in a federal appeals court and, if necessary, the Supreme Court.

In an unsigned two-page order, the court explained that the decision to put the lower courts’ orders on hold “reflects our judgment that the Government faces greater risk of harm from an order allowing a removed officer to continue exercising the executive power than a wrongfully removed officer faces from being unable to perform her statutory duty.” 

Justice Elena Kagan dissented from the court’s order, in an eight-page opinion joined by Justices Sonia Sotomayor and Ketanji Brown Jackson. Calling the order “nothing short of extraordinary,” Kagan would have turned down the Trump administration’s request.  

The dispute stems from Trump’s efforts to remove two federal officials, Gwynne Wilcox of the National Labor Relations Board and Cathy Harris of the Merits Systems Protection Board, earlier this year. Both women were appointed by then-President Joe Biden for terms that were due to expire in 2028. 

Wilcox and Harris went to federal court in Washington, D.C., where they argued that their firings violated federal law because, unlike most federal officials, they can only be removed for good cause. 

Two different federal judges ruled for the officials, ordering the Trump administration to allow them to continue to serve. A three-judge panel of the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit blocked those orders, but the full court of appeals reversed that ruling and reinstated the trial judges’ instructions to allow Wilcox and Harris to remain in office. 

The Trump administration came to the Supreme Court on April 9, asking the justices to put the orders on hold or, in the alternative, take up the dispute and rule on the merits of the cases, without waiting for the court of appeals to weigh in. Trump’s solicitor general, D. John Sauer, contended that the dispute implicates an important constitutional question: the president’s ability to supervise the agency heads who exercise power on his behalf. 

Sauer argued that Trump’s power to fire Wilcox and Harris is not limited by Humphrey’s Executor v. United States, a 1935 Supreme Court case holding that although a president can typically fire subordinates for any reason, Congress can create independent, multi-member regulatory agencies whose commissioners can only be removed for cause. That case, Sauer said, merely recognized a narrow exception to the president’s removal power that applies only to multimember expert agencies that (unlike the MSPB and the NLRB) do not have substantial executive power. 

Harris urged the justices not to intervene. Under Humphrey’s Executor, she emphasized, the MSPB’s structure is clearly constitutional, because the board is “predominantly an adjudicatory body” that “merely hears discrete cases regarding civil servants, and neutrally applies laws Congress passed prohibiting arbitrary dismissal, discrimination, and retaliation.” Harris cautioned that if the court were to conclude that the MSPB’s structure is not constitutional, then “nothing is” – including, crucially, the Federal Reserve.

Wilcox echoed Harris’s warnings about the potential implications of overruling Humphrey’s Executor. She added that the Supreme Court has allowed the law governing the structure of the NLRB to stand for nearly a century. And during that time, she stressed, 14 different presidents have not challenged it. “No real-world harm will come from allowing the ordinary appellate process to unfold over a few more months,” Wilcox wrote.

Less than a week after the D.C. Circuit heard oral arguments in the dispute, the court issued its unsigned opinion. The majority observed that although it would not ultimately decide the issue, the “Government is likely to show that both the NLRB and MSPB exercise considerable executive power.” 

The majority also rejected Harris’s suggestion that a ruling for the government could threaten the structure of the Federal Reserve. The Fed, it wrote, “is a uniquely structured, quasi-private entity that follows in the distinct historical tradition of the First and Second Banks of the United States.” 

In her dissent, Kagan emphasized that Humphrey’s Executor “undergirds a significant feature of American governance: bipartisan administrative bodies carrying out expertise-based functions with a measure of independence from presidential control.” Because it “remains good law,” it also, she wrote, “forecloses both the President’s firings” of Harris and Wilcox and the majority’s “decision to award emergency relief.” Kagan contended that “the order allows the President to overrule Humphrey’s by fiat, again pending our eventual review.” 

Kagan complained that the majority’s order “favors the President over our precedent; and it does so unrestrained by the rules of briefing and argument—and the passage of time—needed to discipline our decision-making.” 

Posted in Emergency appeals and applications, Featured

Cases: Trump v. Wilcox

Recommended Citation:
Amy Howe,
Supreme Court allows Trump to remove agency heads without cause for now,
SCOTUSblog (May. 22, 2025, 6:31 PM),
https://www.scotusblog.com/2025/05/supreme-court-allows-trump-to-remove-agency-heads-without-cause-for-now/



Source link

Tags: agencycourtheadsremoveSupremeTrump
ShareTweetShare
Previous Post

Trump administration revokes Harvard’s ability to enroll international students

Next Post

Gold price turns lower as dollar bounces higher, but debt concerns linger (GLD:NYSEARCA)

Related Posts

edit post
CSU Law’s IP+ Conference 2025

CSU Law’s IP+ Conference 2025

by TheAdviserMagazine
October 18, 2025
0

On Friday, November 14, I’ll be in Cleveland to speak at CSU|LAW’s annual IP+ Conference (with a...

edit post
Chicago Woman Indicted Despite Claims She Was Shot by a Federal Agent

Chicago Woman Indicted Despite Claims She Was Shot by a Federal Agent

by TheAdviserMagazine
October 17, 2025
0

Marimar Martinez was charged on October 5, 2025, with assaulting a federal officer with a deadly or dangerous weapon after...

edit post
Highlights from ClioCon 2025 | Clio

Highlights from ClioCon 2025 | Clio

by TheAdviserMagazine
October 17, 2025
0

18 minutes read Published Oct 17, 2025 ClioCon 2025 showcased the future of legal technology, unveiling transformative innovations designed to...

edit post
The Four Shields That Endanger Children | Kathryn Robb | Verdict

The Four Shields That Endanger Children | Kathryn Robb | Verdict

by TheAdviserMagazine
October 17, 2025
0

Child sexual abuse is not rare. It is an epidemic. One in four girls and one in thirteen boys will...

edit post
Repeated “Nonexistent Cases” in Filing From >20-Lawyer Insurance Defense Firm

Repeated “Nonexistent Cases” in Filing From >20-Lawyer Insurance Defense Firm

by TheAdviserMagazine
October 16, 2025
0

From today's decision in Gittemeier v. Liberty Mutual Pers. Ins. Co. (E.D. Mo.): Gittemeier posits that Liberty Mutual again miscited...

edit post
California Attorney Pleads Guilty For Role In 2M Ponzi Scheme

California Attorney Pleads Guilty For Role In $912M Ponzi Scheme

by TheAdviserMagazine
October 15, 2025
0

Rule of thumb: you should never represent your client in a way that will make you need a lawyer down...

Next Post
edit post
Gold price turns lower as dollar bounces higher, but debt concerns linger (GLD:NYSEARCA)

Gold price turns lower as dollar bounces higher, but debt concerns linger (GLD:NYSEARCA)

edit post
THRO Attracts .2B in Assets as Dow Slides 817 Points

THRO Attracts $3.2B in Assets as Dow Slides 817 Points

  • Trending
  • Comments
  • Latest
edit post
77-year-old popular furniture retailer closes store locations

77-year-old popular furniture retailer closes store locations

October 18, 2025
edit post
Pennsylvania House of Representatives Rejects Update to Child Custody Laws

Pennsylvania House of Representatives Rejects Update to Child Custody Laws

October 7, 2025
edit post
What to Do When a Loved One Dies in North Carolina

What to Do When a Loved One Dies in North Carolina

October 8, 2025
edit post
Probate vs. Non-Probate Assets: What’s the Difference?

Probate vs. Non-Probate Assets: What’s the Difference?

October 17, 2025
edit post
California Attorney Pleads Guilty For Role In 2M Ponzi Scheme

California Attorney Pleads Guilty For Role In $912M Ponzi Scheme

October 15, 2025
edit post
Baby Boomers Are Flocking to This Florida Town — but Not for the Weather

Baby Boomers Are Flocking to This Florida Town — but Not for the Weather

October 9, 2025
edit post
Corning CEO says Jeff Bezos taught him that creating value is less about overcoming failure than, ‘if something is working, double down on it’

Corning CEO says Jeff Bezos taught him that creating value is less about overcoming failure than, ‘if something is working, double down on it’

0
edit post
Navan to aim for -8b valuation in Nasdaq IPO next week

Navan to aim for $7-8b valuation in Nasdaq IPO next week

0
edit post
India, U.S. near trade deal with major tariff cuts, reduced Russian oil purchases

India, U.S. near trade deal with major tariff cuts, reduced Russian oil purchases

0
edit post
Robinhood lists BNB token

Robinhood lists BNB token

0
edit post
A wish list for Carney’s fall budget

A wish list for Carney’s fall budget

0
edit post
Usa Rare Earth (USAR): Dreht die Seltene-Erden-Aktie am kritischen 25-USD-Support?

Usa Rare Earth (USAR): Dreht die Seltene-Erden-Aktie am kritischen 25-USD-Support?

0
edit post
Corning CEO says Jeff Bezos taught him that creating value is less about overcoming failure than, ‘if something is working, double down on it’

Corning CEO says Jeff Bezos taught him that creating value is less about overcoming failure than, ‘if something is working, double down on it’

October 22, 2025
edit post
Navan to aim for -8b valuation in Nasdaq IPO next week

Navan to aim for $7-8b valuation in Nasdaq IPO next week

October 22, 2025
edit post
Robinhood lists BNB token

Robinhood lists BNB token

October 22, 2025
edit post
Usa Rare Earth (USAR): Dreht die Seltene-Erden-Aktie am kritischen 25-USD-Support?

Usa Rare Earth (USAR): Dreht die Seltene-Erden-Aktie am kritischen 25-USD-Support?

October 22, 2025
edit post
Beyond Meat shares surge as meme traders buy stock

Beyond Meat shares surge as meme traders buy stock

October 22, 2025
edit post
Where Will It Be in 1 Year (Oct 22)

Where Will It Be in 1 Year (Oct 22)

October 22, 2025
The Adviser Magazine

The first and only national digital and print magazine that connects individuals, families, and businesses to Fee-Only financial advisers, accountants, attorneys and college guidance counselors.

CATEGORIES

  • 401k Plans
  • Business
  • College
  • Cryptocurrency
  • Economy
  • Estate Plans
  • Financial Planning
  • Investing
  • IRS & Taxes
  • Legal
  • Market Analysis
  • Markets
  • Medicare
  • Money
  • Personal Finance
  • Social Security
  • Startups
  • Stock Market
  • Trading

LATEST UPDATES

  • Corning CEO says Jeff Bezos taught him that creating value is less about overcoming failure than, ‘if something is working, double down on it’
  • Navan to aim for $7-8b valuation in Nasdaq IPO next week
  • Robinhood lists BNB token
  • Our Great Privacy Policy
  • Terms of Use, Legal Notices & Disclosures
  • Contact us
  • About Us

© Copyright 2024 All Rights Reserved
See articles for original source and related links to external sites.

Welcome Back!

Login to your account below

Forgotten Password?

Retrieve your password

Please enter your username or email address to reset your password.

Log In
No Result
View All Result
  • Home
  • Financial Planning
    • Financial Planning
    • Personal Finance
  • Market Research
    • Business
    • Investing
    • Money
    • Economy
    • Markets
    • Stocks
    • Trading
  • 401k Plans
  • College
  • IRS & Taxes
  • Estate Plans
  • Social Security
  • Medicare
  • Legal

© Copyright 2024 All Rights Reserved
See articles for original source and related links to external sites.