The United States Supreme Court has issued a decision that allows President Trump to terminate Commissioners of the Federal Trade Commission even without cause. In Trump v. Slaughter, Doc. No. 25-332, 609 U.S. __ (June 29, 2026), the Supreme Court struck down a federal law that barred the president from firing Commissioners except in cases of “inefficiency, neglect of duty, or malfeasance in office.” The Court reasoned that a law restricting the President’s ability to fire members of the executive branch improperly violated the separation of powers under the Constitution. According to the Court, a President should have the assistance of executive branch officers that he can trust and therefore should have the power to remove subordinates so that they can remain accountable to the President.
This case, which we have previously covered in the Franchise Memorandum (here and here), arose from the Trump administration’s termination of former FTC Commissioners Rebecca Slaughter and Alvaro Bedoya in March 2025. The administration did not identify any legal grounds for firing the two Commissioners, but stated that their continued service would be inconsistent with the administration’s priorities. Slaughter successfully challenged that termination in the District of Columbia and the D.C. Circuit where she argued this was not a valid basis to terminate Commissioners under the FTC Act, which only allowed removal for inefficiency, neglect of duty, or malfeasance. Those decisions were controlled by 90-year-old precedent from the Supreme Court’s decision in Humphrey’s Executor v. United States, which noted that an FTC Commissioner’s duty was neither political nor executive, but predominantly quasi-judicial and quasi-legislative, as they are tasked with enforcing laws that protect consumers from anticompetitive, unfair, and deceptive business practices. The Supreme Court’s June decision overturns Humphrey’s Executor and the congressional restriction it was based upon.
The FTC Act provides for oversight of the agency by five Commissioners, no more than three of whom can be members of the same political party. Each Commissioner is appointed by the President and confirmed by the Senate to serve a seven-year term, which has created a relatively independent bi-partisan commission with authority to monitor and regulate competition and consumer welfare. By allowing a President to remove any of those Commissioners for any reason, the decision in Slaughter now provides an administration with greater power to control the agenda of the federal agency. Of the Commission’s five seats, only two are currently filled by Chairman Andrew Ferguson and Commissioner Mark Meador, both Republicans. President Trump has nominated a third Republican Commissioner who is awaiting Senate confirmation.