The Supreme Court backed Donald President Trump in a case over his firing of Federal Trade Commission Commissioner Rebecca Kelly Slaughter.
In a brief order, the justices said Trump may remove Slaughter while the case is pending.
Arguments are scheduled for December, and the stay allowing her removal will remain until the court issues a ruling.
The case challenges whether statutory protections against removing FTC commissioners violate the separation of powers.
It also questions whether the court’s 1935 decision upholding such protections should be overturned.
Lower courts have blocked removals in similar cases involving Trump’s dismissal of Democratic appointees.
The high court’s left wing dissented.
Justices Elena Kagan, Sonia Sotomayor, and Ketanji Brown Jackson opposed the order.
Kagan wrote the order gives the president “full control” over independent agencies intended to be insulated from political influence, per the Conservative Brief.
“He may now remove — so says the majority, though Congress said differently — any member he wishes, for any reason or no reason at all. And he may thereby extinguish the agencies’ bipartisanship and independence,” Kagan wrote.
Attorney General Pam Bondi praised the Supreme Court decision. She called it a “significant” win that reinforces presidential authority.
“This helps affirm our argument that the President, not a lower court judge, has hiring and firing power over executive officials,” Bondi wrote on social media. “We will continue fighting and winning in court to defend President Trump’s agenda.”
The case stems from Trump’s attempt to remove Slaughter in March.
A lower court ruled the move unlawful under a 1914 law restricting removal to inefficiency, neglect of duty, or malfeasance.
Earlier this month, Chief Justice John Roberts temporarily blocked the lower court’s order while the Supreme Court considered emergency relief.
The Trump administration asked the court to review the constitutionality of the FTC’s removal protections before the appeals court process continues.
Slaughter’s attorneys agreed the issue is ready for Supreme Court review.
This case is part of a series of emergency appeals over Trump’s efforts to remove Democratic appointees from independent agencies.
Most justices have sided with Trump, allowing him to dismiss members of the National Labor Relations Board, the Merit Systems Protection Board, and the Consumer Product Safety Commission despite statutory protections.
The rulings raise questions about the future of Humphrey’s Executor v. United States, the 1935 precedent upholding Congress’s power to restrict presidential removals.
Lower courts have cited Humphrey’s Executor in reinstating officials Trump sought to fire, but the growing number of disputes has pushed the Supreme Court to clarify the scope of presidential removal power.
Justice Brett Kavanaugh, in a concurring opinion on a related case, warned that “the downsides of delay in definitively resolving the status of the precedent sometimes tend to outweigh the benefits of further lower-court consideration.”
Trump first appointed Slaughter to the FTC in 2018. She was reappointed by former President Joe Biden to a term set to run through 2029.
