The Supreme Courts latest ruling on presidential authority has been hailed by conservative legal scholar John Yoo as the most consequential shift in the structure of the federal government in nearly a century.
Appearing on Fox News to react to a series of decisions released on Monday, Yoo argued that the 63 decision empowering President Donald Trump to remove Federal Trade Commission Commissioner Rebecca Slaughter at will fundamentally reshapes the modern administrative state. According to Mediaite, Yoo framed the ruling as a decisive victory for constitutional originalism and for those who have long warned that sprawling, semi-independent agencies undermine both democratic accountability and the separation of powers.
Yoo, a University of California, Berkeley law professor and former Justice Department official in the George W. Bush administration, stressed that the decision does far more than resolve a personnel dispute at the FTC. He said the ruling effectively restores broad presidential control over the alphabet soup of federal agencies that have, for decades, operated with significant insulation from the White House.
This decision is the, perhaps, the most important decision about the operation of the government since 1935, Yoo said, invoking the New Deal era when Congress first began constructing powerful regulatory bodies shielded from direct presidential oversight. He noted that the courts opinion undercuts the legal foundations of that model, which had allowed lawmakers to limit the presidents ability to supervise and remove key executive-branch officials.
Yoo argued that the implications extend well beyond the FTC, striking at the heart of the progressive vision of independent commissions. No longer will there be an FTC, FCC, Yoo continued. All those agencies were designed by Congress to be outside the presidents control, and the court says clearly that is not consistent with the vesting by the Founders of the executive power only in the president and none of these other [branches].
He went on to explain that the ruling effectively pulls these agencies back under the constitutional chain of command envisioned by the Framers. [Government agencies] will all be directly under the control of the president now, he said. So it almost doesnt matter whether they are in the Treasury Department or in the State Department because the president now can give them orders and fire them if they dont obey. That makes the head of Federal Trade Commission which exercises enormous power over the economy as fully accountable to the president as the Treasury secretary is, Scott Bessent.
For conservatives who have long criticized the administrative state as an unelected fourth branch of government, Yoo said the decision restores democratic responsibility. The point the court makes is we elect the president. Not any of these other people. We elect the top of the branch and all the agencies underneath have to be accountable to someone that we the voters know and we the voters can hold responsible.
SCOTUSBlog described the ruling as a sweeping endorsement of the unitary executive theory, which holds that all executive power is vested in the president alone. Under that view, any statutory limits on the presidents ability to remove executive officials are constitutionally suspect because they dilute his authority and blur accountability.
Writing for the majority, Chief Justice John Roberts underscored that logic in constitutional terms. He wrote that the President must have the assistance of officers he can trust. Although it is up to the Senate to decide whether to confirm those with whom the President would to work, neither Congress nor the courts may saddle him with those with whom he work. Subordinates who exercise the Presidents power are subject to removal by him. Then, and only then, can they remain accountable to the President, and the President to the people.
Trump, who has repeatedly clashed with entrenched bureaucracies and regulatory agencies, quickly celebrated the decision as a vindication of his long-standing critique of Washingtons permanent class. On Truth Social, he called it a BIG WIN, adding in a follow-up post, To show the importance of the Slaughter Case, 90 years of precedent has been COMPLETELY AND UNEQUIVOCALLY OVERRULED, greatly increasing Presidential Power at a time when it is most needed!
For supporters of limited government and constitutional restraint, the ruling represents a rare rollback of the unelected bureaucracy that has steadily expanded since the New Deal. For progressives who favor powerful, insulated regulators, it is a serious blow, raising the prospect that agencies like the FTC and FCC could not only be brought firmly to heel by an elected president, but, as Yoo suggested, potentially dismantled altogether if voters choose a chief executive determined to do so.
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