BREAKING — Published June 30, 2026 · By Roe Baynes · 3 Min Read
The Supreme Court on Monday overturned a 90-year-old precedent that shielded heads of independent federal agencies from being fired without cause, handing President Trump one of the most consequential wins of the term. The ruling, Trump v. Slaughter, effectively ends Humphrey’s Executor v. United States — and in a companion case decided the same day, the Court drew a surprising line where the White House didn’t get everything it wanted.
The Vote
Slaughter was 6-3, with Chief Justice John Roberts writing for all six conservative justices. Justices Sonia Sotomayor, Elena Kagan, and Ketanji Brown Jackson dissented — and Sotomayor took the rare step of reading a summary of her dissent aloud from the bench, a signal of unusually strong disagreement.
What Humphrey’s Executor Was
In 1935, the Court unanimously ruled that Congress could protect commissioners of agencies like the FTC from being fired except for “inefficiency, neglect of duty, or malfeasance” — insulating them from at-will presidential removal. That case, too, involved an FTC commissioner: Franklin Roosevelt fired one over policy disagreements, and the Court said he couldn’t. It stood as the foundation for roughly two dozen “independent” federal agencies ever since.
The Majority Opinion
Roberts wrote that “if anything more is left of Humphrey’s, the Court overrules it.” His reasoning: the modern FTC “unquestionably exercises executive power” and therefore must answer to the president, not to Congress-imposed insulation. “Subordinates who exercise the President’s power are subject to removal by him,” he wrote. “Then, and only then, can they remain accountable to the President, and the President to the people.” The ruling directly frees Trump to fire FTC Commissioner Rebecca Slaughter, whom he removed without cause in March 2025, and the same logic is expected to extend to similarly structured agencies like the SEC, CFTC, and NLRB.
The Dissent
Sotomayor didn’t hold back, writing that “the majority reshapes our Government” and hands the president “a power unknown even to the English Crown against which the Founders revolted.” She warned that “dozens of independent commissions are now likely to become purely executive agencies,” concentrating decision-making power that Congress deliberately spread out.
The Fed Carve-Out
In a companion case decided the same day, Trump v. Cook, the Court ruled 5-4 the other way — blocking, for now, Trump’s attempt to fire Federal Reserve Governor Lisa Cook. Roberts wrote that the Fed’s independence traces back to the First and Second Banks of the United States and reflects Founding-era concerns about political control over monetary policy, making it a narrow historical exception rather than a typical independent agency. The Court didn’t decide whether Trump can ultimately remove Cook — that question goes back to a lower court — but for now, the Fed stands apart from the FTC, SEC, and every other agency swept up in Monday’s ruling.
Trump’s Reaction
Trump celebrated Slaughter as the biggest win of the term, writing on Truth Social that “90 years of precedent has been COMPLETELY AND UNEQUIVOCALLY OVERRULED, greatly increasing Presidential Power at a time when it is most needed.” He tied the case to a decades-long fight over executive authority dating back to FDR, whose own frustration with the same precedent led him to propose court-packing in the 1930s.
What Comes Next
The ruling’s reach goes well beyond the FTC. Legal analysts expect the same reasoning to apply to the SEC, CFTC, FERC, and NLRB, though courts will have to work through each agency’s specific structure. The one confirmed exception, for now, is the Federal Reserve — leaving open a real question of how far this new presidential power actually extends, and how soon the Court will be asked to answer it again.
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