HR leaders don’t have the luxury of rewriting their compliance strategy every four years. A recent Supreme Court ruling raises new questions about just how long today’s enforcement priorities will last.
In Trump v. Slaughter, the Court concluded that federal agency leaders who exercise executive power can be removed by the President at will.
Here’s why that matters – and what to watch for now.
When President Trump began his second term in January 2025, he made a lot of fast changes. He issued a slew of executive orders and removed several Democratic members of independent regulatory agencies.
Rebecca Slaughter was a Federal Trade Commission (FTC) commissioner at the time.
FTC commissioners serve seven-year terms and, under the agency’s governing statute, the President may remove them only “for inefficiency, neglect of duty, or malfeasance in office.”
In March 2025, Trump fired Slaughter and fellow Commissioner Alvaro Bedoya without citing any of those statutory grounds. Instead, he told them their continued service didn’t align with his administration’s priorities and that he was acting under his authority as President.
Slaughter sued, arguing Trump didn’t have the authority to remove her.
The district court agreed and ordered her reinstatement, citing Humphrey’s Executor v. United States, a 1935 Supreme Court decision that had long barred the President from removing FTC commissioners at will.
After the D.C. Circuit declined to pause...
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