Slaughter ruling is about presidential powers ‒ not Trump | Opinion

On June 29, the Supreme Court upheld President Donald Trump's firing of Federal Trade Commissioner Rebecca Slaughter. The case may have flown under the radar for many, but the decision could be the most important of the term.

The 6-3 ruling restores the president's authority over the executive branch, bringing independent agencies back under its purview where they belong.

This decision will surely be framed as an expansion of Trump's power, but that view misses important context for how the Supreme Court is operating. Chief Justice John Roberts wants to realign the three branches into their constitutional roles, and this ruling is another step in that direction.

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What was Trump v. Slaughter about?

In March 2025, Trump fired Slaughter from the FTC. The commission is an independent agency established by Congress, and the statute creating it mandates that no more than three of its five commissioners be from the same political party.

The statute also only allows the president to fire commissioners "for cause" ‒ meaning "inefficiency, neglect of duty, or malfeasance in office."

In removing Slaughter, Trump said her tenure "is inconsistent with my Administration's priorities." Slaughter sued, and her case made its way to the Supreme Court, which granted review on whether the statutory limits on the president's power to fire commissioners violate the separation of powers.

The precedent at the core of the case is a 1935 ruling, Humphrey's Executor v. United States, which considered the same statute and the same question. The Supreme Court upheld it, and that precedent had stood for more than 90 years.

Certain members of the court had cast doubt on Humphrey's Executor in recent years, to the point that many viewed it as a precedent on its deathbed. "If anything more is left of Humphrey's, the Court overrules it," Chief Justice Roberts wrote.

"Although it is up to the Senate to decide whether to confirm those with whom the President would prefer to work, neither Congress nor the courts may saddle him with those with whom he cannot work," Roberts wrote for the majority. "Subordinates who exercise the President's power are subject to removal by him. Then, and only then, can they remain accountable to the President, and the President to the people."

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This decision continues the rise of "unitary executive theory" ‒ the idea that all executive power is vested in the president, giving him complete control over his branch of government.

As Roberts put it, the Constitution vests "the executive Power" in a single president and instructs him to "take Care that the Laws be faithfully executed." These officers, the chief justice explained, "exercise the President's power, not their own, and thus must be responsible to him."

Justice Sonia Sotomayor's dissent, joined by the court's two other Democratic appointees, took a different view: "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."

The decision expands presidential power, but it's about more than that

The ruling will surely be framed as a 6-3 win for Trump, but that shallow reading does a disservice to understanding what the Roberts Court is actually trying to accomplish.

One of the primary issues plaguing the federal government is the three branches veering out of their lanes. The president has tried to usurp legislative power by taxing and waging war while Congress sits by idly, leaving the courts to sort out the mess.

At the end of her dissent, Sotomayor warned of "a President who emerges with far greater power than ever before."

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In many cases ‒ such as the Supreme Court's ruling against Trump's tariffs ‒ the Roberts Court's approach has meant curtailing executive power that overstepped into Congress' authority.

The Constitution affords the power of taxation to Congress, not the president. In that case, Trump tried to stretch a narrow statute granting the president authority to "regulate" imports into a wholesale overhaul of tariff rates on nearly every country on earth.

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In cases like that one, the Roberts Court has had no problem curtailing executive power, even by a Republican president.

But when the question is the president's discretion over his own branch, the court has tended to expand it.

Understanding the Roberts Court's project takes more nuance than the typical partisan lens allows. The Slaughter case is a win for Trump, but it's a win for the office of the president itself ‒ not for any one man.

Dace Potas is an opinion columnist for USA TODAY and a graduate of DePaul University with a degree in political science.

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This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: Slaughter ruling is about presidential powers ‒ not Trump | Opinion