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The administration then sought a stay from the Supreme Court, which voted to grant the request in September 2025 amid three judicial dissents.
Justice Sonia Sotomayor issued the primary dissenting opinion on behalf of the minority judges.
"Today, this Court undoes centuries of political practice and concludes that all three branches of Government have been acting in open defiance of the Constitution all this time.
Its conclusion is wrong," wrote Sotomayor, joined by Kagan and Jackson.
The dissenting justices argued that historical practices and constitutional text grant Congress the authority to protect commission heads from arbitrary presidential removal.
"The text of the Constitution, along with its history, the longstanding practices of the political branches, and the precedents of this Court, make clear that Congress may limit the causes for which the heads of Commissions like the FTC can be removed by the President," they continued.
Sotomayor warned that the decision radically alters the constitutional balance of power between coequal branches of government.
"In holding otherwise, the Court gives the President a power unknown even to the English Crown against which the Founders revolted, elevating him above his once coequal branches by transforming a duty to take care that the laws be faithfully executed into a license to act in defiance of those very laws," they continued.
Broader Implications for Agency Independence
Former government officials previously issued warnings in an October 2025 Economic Policy Institute report regarding the broader consequences of dismantling these protections.
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"Eliminating these removal protections would jeopardize all facets of agency independence, as agency leaders would be reluctant to engage in regulatory or enforcement actions – or even day-to-day agency decision-making – without coordinating with the White House for fear of termination," wrote Lauren McFerran, former National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) chair, and Celine McNicholas, a former official at the NLRB, in the report.
