Supreme Court hands Trump a win on Consumer Product Safety Commission firings [View all]
Source: USA Today
Updated July 23, 2025, 5:06 p.m. ET
WASHINGTON – President Donald Trump can fire three Democratic members of the Consumer Product Safety Commission for now the Supreme Court said on July 23 in the latest decision boosting the ability of the president to control independent agencies. The ruling was made over the objections of the court’s three liberal justices.
“Once again, this Court uses its emergency docket to destroy the independence of an independent agency, as established by Congress,” Justice Elena Kagan wrote. "By means of such actions, this Court may facilitate the permanent transfer of authority, piece by piece by piece, from one branch of Government to another."
The five-member regulatory commission, created by Congress in 1972, aims to keep people from being injured or killed by defective or harmful products. Commissioners are appointed by the president and confirmed by the Senate in staggered seven-year terms to protect them from political or industry pressure and to protect the agency from abrupt changes in composition. By law, commissioners can be removed only for “neglect of duty or malfeasance in office.”
But, in May, Trump fired without cause the three members appointed by President Joe Biden: Mary Boyle, Alexander Hoehn-Saric and Richard Trumka Jr. A federal judge in Maryland ordered the commissioners reinstated, saying the threat to public safety from removing them outweighed any hardship the administration might suffer from keeping them on while the firings are being challenged.
Read more: https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/politics/2025/07/23/supreme-court-trump-consumer-product-safety-commission/85196601007/
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