Overview
- The Supreme Court, which issued the rulings on June 29, 2026, overruled the 1935 Humphrey’s Executor in Trump v. Slaughter and held that the president may remove FTC commissioners and comparable multimember agency officials without statutory “for cause” protections.
- In a separate decision, Trump v. Cook, the Court left Federal Reserve Governor Lisa Cook in place and preserved the Fed’s statutory tenure protections for now, with the justices signaling a distinct constitutional treatment for the central bank.
- The change exposes agencies such as the SEC, CFTC, FDIC, NLRB and others to quicker leadership turnover because presidents can replace commissioners to align agencies with administration priorities.
- Dissenting justices warned the majority’s reasoning embraces a broad unitary executive theory that could politicize expertise-based regulation, while President Trump hailed the Slaughter ruling as a major expansion of presidential power.
- Expect waves of litigation and possible congressional responses to define limits on removals, and watch for near-term market and enforcement shifts as regulators and regulated industries adjust to new political pressure and uncertainty.