The Supreme Court ruled Monday that President Trump can fire commissioners at the Federal Trade Commission and other independent agencies without cause, overturning a 91-year-old precedent that shielded regulators including the SEC and CFTC from at-will removal. The 6-3 decision in Trump v. Slaughter directly reinstated Trump’s 2025 firing of FTC Commissioner Rebecca Slaughter.
Chief Justice John Roberts wrote for the majority that Humphrey’s Executor v. United States, the 1935 case that let Congress protect FTC commissioners from removal except for “inefficiency, neglect of duty, or malfeasance in office,” has “not withstood the test of time.” SCOTUSblog reported the ruling extends to roughly two dozen multi-member agencies Congress designed to operate independently. Justice Sonia Sotomayor’s dissent, joined by Justices Elena Kagan and Ketanji Brown Jackson, argued the majority handed the president “far greater power than ever before.”
The opinion does not name the SEC or CFTC directly, but both agencies’ commissioners serve under similar for-cause removal statutes, meaning Decrypt reported the ruling puts them within its reach at a pivotal moment for crypto-market oversight.
The decision arrives as Senate Republican leadership pushes for a floor vote on the CLARITY Act next month. Senate Democrats have said they will not back the bill, which would give the SEC and CFTC expanded authority over crypto markets, unless Trump commits to appointing Democrats to both agencies.
Trump told Decrypt in December he was “open” to naming Democratic commissioners but has made no such appointments in the six months since. The ruling now lets him remove any Democrat he might appoint just as easily.
The Defiant has covered the SEC’s recent commissioner turnover, including Republican Hester Peirce’s departure after nearly three decades at the agency, and the CFTC’s aggressive posture on prediction-market jurisdiction under Selig. SEC Chair Paul Atkins and Selig jointly issued a March interpretation clarifying crypto asset treatment under federal law, an effort now made easier to reverse under a future administration, or entrench under this one, without commissioners who could outlast a president’s term.
The CLARITY Act faces a deadline stakeholders have pegged to early August, ahead of November’s midterm elections, to have a realistic path to becoming law.
