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yesterday

Perlmutter Asks Supreme Court to Preserve Reinstatement in Clash Over Presidential Removal Power

Her brief argues Congress organized the Library of Congress outside the executive branch, leaving the president without authority to remove her.

A sign on the facade of the Library of Congress is seen in Washington on May 21, 2025. (Wesley Lapointe/for The Washington Post via Getty Images)

Overview

  • Shira Perlmutter urged the Supreme Court to leave in place a D.C. Circuit order that temporarily returned her to the post of Register of Copyrights.
  • The Solicitor General asked the justices to vacate that order, arguing the Register wields executive power and is therefore removable by the president, and contending reinstatement is an improper remedy.
  • Perlmutter’s filing says the Library of Congress is not an executive agency, so the president lacked power to install Todd Blanche as acting Librarian and any subsequent effort to oust her was invalid.
  • Her brief warns that accepting the administration’s theory would let presidents create vacancies by firing principal officers to seize appointment authority that Congress placed elsewhere.
  • The dispute follows Trump’s May 8 dismissal of Librarian Carla Hayden and a May 10 firing notice to Perlmutter sent the day after an AI policy report, and it arrives as the Court considers a related removal case involving an FTC commissioner.