SCOTUS allows Trump to fire Biden-appointed FTC commissioner

The Supreme Court on Monday backed President Donald Trump's decision to fire a commissioner on the Federal Trade Commission, sending yet another signal that the high court intends to revisit a 90-year-old court precedent about executive firing power.

The temporary decision to maintain Biden-appointed commissioner Rebecca Slaughter's termination was issued 6-3 along ideological lines. The Supreme Court set oral arguments in the case for December.

Trump's decision to fire Slaughter and another Democrat-appointed commissioner, Alvaro Bedoya, faced legal challenges because it stood in tension with the FTC Act, which says commissioners should only be fired from their seven-year tenures for cause, such as malfeasance.

FTC FIRINGS TAKE SPOTLIGHT IN TRUMP'S FIGHT TO ERASE INDEPENDENCE OF AGENCIES

Rebecca Slaughter, commissioner at the Federal Trade Commission (FTC), during a House Judiciary Committee hearing in Washington, DC, US, on Thursday, July 13, 2023. Photographer: Al Drago/Bloomberg via Getty Images (Al Drago/Bloomberg via Getty Images)

Trump fired Slaughter and Bedoya shortly after he took office without citing a cause other than the president's broad constitutional authority over the executive branch. Bedoya resigned, but Slaughter vowed to fight her firing in court and see the case through to its conclusion.

A lower court initially sided with Slaughter and reinstated her, but she has since been fired and re-hired several times as her case made its way to the Supreme Court. The Supreme Court's decision to keep Slaughter's firing intact means she will remain sidelined from the FTC until after the high court hears arguments about the merits of the case in December.

Slaughter argued to the Supreme Court that siding with Trump, even on an interim basis, disturbs the precedent set in Humphrey's Executor vs. the United States during President Franklin D. Roosevelt's administration.

"Granting a stay would hand the President plenary control over pre- and post-1935 powers that Congress decided not to place in the President alone, including the precise powers this Court held Congress could and did vest in an insulated FTC," Slaughter's attorneys wrote.

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Fox News Digital reached out to a representative for Slaughter for comment.

This is a developing story. Check back for updates.