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Supreme Court rules president can remove independent-agency appointees

politicsJun 29, 202611920,025

In Slaughter, the Supreme Court held that the president may remove heads of most independent federal agencies, overturning a long-standing 1935 precedent that had limited presidential removal power. Chief Justice John Roberts wrote the majority opinion, a decision variously reported as 6-3, that explicitly lets presidents fire independent-agency leaders for any reason or no reason. Justice Sonia Sotomayor wrote a vigorous dissent, delivering roughly 20 minutes and saying the majority handed the president unprecedented power to reshape government. Commentators and former officials warned the ruling hands sweeping removal authority to Donald Trump and said it will also be available to future presidents of either party. Legal critics said the decision undermines the separation of powers and upends decades of congressional statutes that assumed agency independence. Supporters of the ruling argued it restores presidential control over the executive branch; opponents urged Congress to respond to protect agency functions.

Ron Filipkowski
@ronfilipkowski.bsky.social

The Roberts court continues to reshape the American Republic into a governing system dominated by an Imperial Presidency.

584145d ago
Ned Resnikoff
@resnikoff.bsky.social

Again, if there's a Democratic majority in the House in 2027, I think it's imperative that they start impeaching Supreme Court justices.

315945d ago
Nicholas Handler
@nicholashandler.bsky.social

I don’t have much to say about Slaughter, and honestly I think we do too much justice to the Roberts Court by treating its opinions like serious judicial reasoning. But I will say that it’s striking how openly the court treats congressional oversight as somehow antithetical to democratic government

245145d ago
Quoting this
lastpositivist.bsky.social44

I know this is crude but - is it the opinion of the US Supreme Court members that Trump is, like, good? Do they think he's doing a good job, that the sort of populist slop Bonapartist/mercantile monarch thing is good? Is it good for them, do they personally profit, maybe get in on the stock trades?

Professa Murray17

1/I am on vacation, folks, and was literally swimming with joyful dolphins (my enduring Porpoise!), and I don’t really process decisions until I teach them, but I have expecting this for awhile.

Jon Becker13

Every member of Congress (especially the GOP) should be asked what they think their job is anymore.

justin van wormer7

Worth considering how many of them just really do have a dumb guy who watches Fox News (because they are) idea of their role: we decide whether a law is good or not so Congress or the President don’t screw up the country by making decisions that aren’t American enough. By my count at least 3.

Genie Lauren3

How can we start sabotaging the court?

Robin Johnson3

This! The supreme court decisions aren't inexplicably stupid. They're explicably evil.

Lindsey Barrett3

+1 to this. operationalizing dominant yet methodically stupid and morally insidious modes of reasoning is sometimes necessary as a persuasive stopgap. In all other situations, CLARIFY AND EMPHASIZE THAT IT IS NOT LEGITIMATE AND SUCKS

Gallifrey Stands2

💯 to the last sentence!

Alice Jane Grimm (she/her)2

We are still fighting the heirs of secession and segregation who equate Democracy with the equality of white men in their superiority over Black people and reject as tyrannical any body that gives representation to Black communities, even one as flawed as Congress

PINO FOTUS
@pino-fotus.bsky.social

“In the Slaughter case, Justice Sotomayor delivered her dissent for 20 minutes. She was visibly angry. She talks about how they’re handing the president unprecedented power to reshape this government.” I would like to know how many Supreme Court justices are in the #Epstein files?

182344d ago
Nicholas Grossman
@nicholasgrossman.bsky.social

The notion that the president has absolute power over creations of Congress is already nuts, with no basis in law, but it reaches utterly absurd when it includes an unwritten "but not when some Supreme Court Justices feel like he's messing with the money" exception.

115145d ago
Andy Craig
@andycraig.bsky.social

Tomorrow there will be a certain sort insisting that the birthright decision, assuming it goes as expected, proves the Roberts Court is some paragon of judicial independence. It proves nothing except that they're marginally less insane than the craziest white nationalists in Trump's inner circle.

75745d ago
Aubrey Gilleran
@aubreygilleran.bsky.social

A century of congressional laws, passed by both parties, about the shape and functions of executive agencies need to be done away with because independent agencies offend Gorsuch’s simplistic ideal of what the government should be.

34245d ago
Mia Farrow
@miafarrow.bsky.social

In a slashing dissent from the Supreme Court’s decision today that allows Trump to fire leaders of independent agencies for any reason or no reason, Justice Sotomayor wrote that the majority had destroyed the separation of powers & upended settled constitutional law." www.nytimes.com/2026/06/29/u...

28944d ago
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