Overview

• Rebecca Kelly Slaughter filed a 40-page petition asking to remain as an FTC commissioner while litigation proceeds, arguing Humphrey’s Executor still controls and should not be upended on the emergency docket.
• The Supreme Court’s administrative stay issued by Chief Justice John Roberts on Sept. 8 keeps her removal in effect as the justices consider the government’s application.
• The Solicitor General says her case is indistinguishable from recent NLRB, MSPB, and CPSC removals the Court allowed to stand temporarily, whereas lower courts said Humphrey’s Executor is directly on point for the FTC.
• Slaughter’s counsel warns that weakening for‑cause protections would undercut the legal basis for the Federal Reserve’s independence, even as prior orders suggested the Fed could be treated differently.
• Slaughter was removed by email in March and later won a district-court order and a D.C. Circuit ruling for reinstatement; former commissioner Alvaro Bedoya, also removed, resigned in June.