Cnn
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Chief judge John Roberts authorized President Donald Trump on Wednesday to temporarily withdraw two members of the board of directors from independent work agencies while the judges wonder if the president could dismiss them permanently.
The brief ordinance does not necessarily indicate in which direction the court leans in the case. Instead, the procedural decision will give judges for a few days to examine the written arguments before deciding whether or not to grant Trump’s request.
The emergency case follows a decision by a Washington Court of Appeal which temporarily restored Gwynne Wilcox, member of the National Labor Relations Board, and Cathy Harris, president of the Merit Systems Protection Board.
Roberts ordered members of the Board of Directors to respond to Trump’s emergency call on April 15.
Although the dispute is technical and involves agencies that most Americans do not know, it could have deep implications for Trump’s efforts to consolidate power within the executive branch – especially if the conservative court takes Trump at his request to hear arguments in the case later this year.
“The president should not be forced to delegate his executive power to agency leaders who are obviously in contradiction with the administration’s political objectives for a single day – even less for the months that it would probably be necessary in the courts to resolve this dispute,” said General D. John Sauer, the twin of the Trump administration earlier on Wednesday.
The underlying trial raises fundamental questions about the authority of the president to withdraw officials from the executive branch who, according to Congress, could only be rejected because – as ineffectiveness or embezzlement – and not because the president does not agree with their decisions. In recent years, the Supreme Conservative Court has evolved towards the expansion of the president’s power to control the independent agencies.
“This case raises a constitutional question of great importance: if the president can supervise and control the agency leaders who exercise a vast executive power on behalf of the president, or if the congress can isolate these heads of the presidential control agency by preventing the president from removing them at will,” wrote Sauer.
A panel of three judges of the DC Court of Appeals circuit initially ruled for the Trump administration, but the complete court of the appeal voted 7-4 on Monday to destroy this decision, restoring the members of the board of directors.
“The Supreme Court has repeatedly declared the Appeal Courts to follow the previous Supreme Court unless and until the court changes or overturns it,” the majority of the DC circuit wrote in its decision on Monday.
The Supreme Court in 1935 judged that the congress may demand that the presidents present a cause – such as embezzlement – before rejecting the members of the board of directors supervising the independent agencies. But in recent years, the conservatives of the High Court have slowly dismissed the independence of these agencies, giving the President more to be able to control all the agencies which fall under the executive branch.
The decision of the DC circuit reintegrating two officials meant that a quorum had been restored to the NLRB and the MSPB, allowing agencies to operate at full power and the treatment of cases involving federal employment disputes. Agencies are a critical bulwark against Trump’s efforts to quickly reduce the size of the federal workforce and draw thousands of employees.
The seven judges of the DC circuit who supported the reintegration of labor officials were appointed by Democratic presidents, and the four dissident judges were appointed by Republicans.
The Washington Federal Court of Appeal, DC, initially ruled that Trump could withdraw Wilcox and Harris.
“The Supreme Court said that Congress cannot limit the president’s dismissal authority to agencies that” exercise substantial executive power, “wrote the US circuit Justin Walker, appointed by Trump.
This story was updated after Roberts’ decision.
The Marshall Cohen of CNN contributed to this report.
