President Trump fired the two Democratic members of the Federal Trade Commission on Tuesday, a rejection of the corporate regulator’s traditional independence that will clear the way for the administration’s agenda and could draw a legal challenge.
The White House told the Democrats, Rebecca Kelly Slaughter and Alvaro Bedoya, that the president was terminating their roles. Congress created the F.T.C. to enforce consumer protection and antitrust laws. It typically has five members, with the president’s party holding three seats and the opposing party two.
“Today the president illegally fired me from my position as a federal trade commissioner, violating the plain language of a statute and clear Supreme Court precedent,” Ms. Slaughter said in a statement. “Why? Because I have a voice. And he is afraid of what I’ll tell the American people.”
Mr. Trump’s maneuver is his latest attempt to assert the power of the presidency over independent regulators at agencies inside the U.S. government. Most of those regulators are presidential appointees who have traditionally had wide latitude to determine the direction of their agencies.
But the Trump administration has disregarded the traditional protections for those presidential appointees.
This is a developing story. Check back for updates.