CSS Condemns Trump’s Actions Against Independent Agencies

February 25, 2025 | Download PDF

Dear President Trump:

The Coalition for Sensible Safeguards and the undersigned groups are alarmed by and strongly condemn your unprecedented actions curtailing the legal authority of independent agencies to exist and fulfill the statutory missions defined for them by Congress in order to insulate them from Presidential influence. We strongly object to the firing of multiple Democratic appointed Commissioners at independent government agencies and the extreme and problematic Executive Order placing independent agencies under direct presidential control. Both of these actions are not only a blatant power grab and a continuation of this administration’s handouts to corporate interests at the expense of the public interest, but they are also patently unlawful, a direct affront to Congressional authority, and a fundamental violation of the separation of powers enshrined by our Constitution. We demand that you immediately reinstate the fired Commissioners to reverse the damage and abstain from any further efforts to destroy the independence of these agencies. We further demand that you revoke the Executive Order requiring OIRA review for independent agencies.

For more than a century, Congress has established independent agencies with multi-member commissions to fulfill the missions Congress gave them to protect the public. This design was meant to insulate them against direct political interference from the president and reflects the technical nature of their work and their unique significance to advancing the public interest. These agencies have been crucial to protecting the rights of workers, protecting consumers from unsafe products, policing financial markets and investor protection, preventing discrimination, ensuring our elections are free and fair, and much more. Your actions will block these agencies from doing the job Congress gave them, allowing corporations to flout regulatory safeguards from independent agencies while the public pays the price.

To be clear, these firings are a flagrant violation of current law. Ninety years ago, the Supreme Court upheld[1] that the Constitution allows congressional limits on executive authority to remove commissioners at multi-member commissions. This ruling recognizes the Constitutional authority of Congress, based on separation of powers, to insulate agencies from partisan political pressure, including by protecting commissioners or ensuring that there is bipartisan representation in an agency, as required by statute. Your actions, and particularly the partisan targeting of independent agency commissioners, directly undermines Congressional intent to preserve the independence of these agencies and ensure representation from both political parties in the leadership structure of these agencies.

Because some independent agencies with multi-member commissions must have a minimum number of commissioners in order to take important actions such as adopting regulations or authorizing enforcement actions, your firings not only gut the independence of these agencies, they also may result in those agencies being unable to implement and enforce bedrock public protection laws passed by Congress.

We strongly urge you to follow the law under long standing Supreme Court precedent and respect congressional intent to place limits on your ability to remove independent agency commissioners which is directly Congress’ authority. It is critical that you take action to reinstate the fired commissioners and revoke the Executive Order curtailing the independence of these agencies so that they can continue to do their vital job of protecting the American public from corporate wrongdoers.

Sincerely,

AFL-CIO
American Federation of Government Employees, AFL-CIO (AFGE)
Americans for Financial Reform
Center for Biological Diversity
Center for Democracy & Technology
Center for Digital Democracy
Center for Economic Justice
Center for LGBTQ Economic Advancement & Research (CLEAR)
Center for Progressive Reform
Center for Responsible Lending
Center for Science in the Public Interest (CSPI)
Check My Ads Institute
Clean Water Action
Coalition for Sensible Safeguards
Coalition on Human Needs
Communications Workers of America (CWA)
Consumer Action
Consumer Federation of America
Consumers Council of Missouri
Earthjustice
Economic Policy Institute
Electronic Privacy Information Center (EPIC)
Endangered Species Coalition
Friends of the Earth
Government Information Watch
Greenpeace USA
International Association of Machinists and Aerospace Workers
Japanese American Citizens League
JustLeadershipUSA
JustUS Coordinating Council
League of Conservation Voters
League of United Latin American Citizens (LULAC)
National Association of Consumer Advocates
National Consumers League
National Council of Asian Pacific Americans (NCAPA)
National Employment Law Project
National Federation of Federal Employees (NFFE-IAM)
National Partnership for Women & Families
National Urban League
P Street
People For the American Way
People Power United
Progressive Leadership Alliance of Nevada
Project On Government Oversight
Public Citizen
Public Knowledge
Rachel Carson Council
Sciencecorps
South Carolina Appleseed Legal Justice Center
The Restaurant Opportunities Centers United (ROC United)
Union of Concerned Scientists
United Church of Christ Media Justice Ministry
Virginia Citizens Consumer Council
Women Employed
Womxn From The Mountain

cc: Members of Congress

[1] See Humphrey’s Executor v. United States, 295 U.S. 602 (1935).