Federal Trade Commissioners Rebecca Kelly Slaughter and Alvaro M. Bedoya File Motion for Summary Judgment in Suit Against Trump Administration

In March, Commissioners Slaughter and Bedoya sued the Trump administration for attempting to illegally fire them without legal cause in defiance of 90 years of Supreme Court precedent.    

Washington, D.C. — On Thursday, April 10, 2025, Federal Trade Commissioners Alvaro M. Bedoya and Rebecca Kelly Slaughter filed a motion for summary judgment in their lawsuit against the Trump administration. The commissioners recently filed suit in federal district court after the administration illegally attempted to fire them without cause before the end of their Senate-confirmed terms. 

“As we speak, Americans are seeing how a president’s unfettered power and unpredictable whims can wreak havoc on the global economy,” said Amit Agarwal, Special Counsel for Protect Democracy, who previously served as Florida’s Solicitor General under Pam Bondi and clerked for Justice Alito and then-Judge Kavanaugh. “America’s economic prosperity depends on stability, integrity, and the rule of law. If courts allow the Trump Administration to defy nearly a century of settled precedent affirming Congress’s right to protect the integrity of economic regulators, we should all brace for even more chaos and market instability.”

In 1935, the Supreme Court ruled unanimously in Humphrey’s Executor v. United States that the president cannot fire FTC Commissioners except for “inefficiency, neglect of duty, or malfeasance in office.” The protection from politically-motivated termination allows regulators to do their job and serve the public without fear or favor. For decades, the same legal principle has protected the integrity of the Federal Reserve and other key economic regulatory agencies within the federal government. 

“This is not a close case.  FTC Commissioners have been protected from being fired without cause for 111 years, the Supreme Court unanimously upheld those protections 90 years ago in Humphrey’s Executor, and courts have been adhering to that precedent ever since,” said Aaron Crowell, Partner at Clarick Gueron Reisbaum LLP. “We look forward to helping Commissioners Slaughter and Bedoya get back to work for the American people.” 

The motion asserts that “the law is well-settled, and Plaintiffs are entitled to immediate summary judgment. Both the FTC Act and Supreme Court precedent compel the conclusion that the President’s attempt to terminate Plaintiffs is unlawful. . . . [T]his Court . . . is duty-bound to apply the binding precedent that has protected FTC Commissioners for nearly a century.”