Trump Fires Both Democratic FTC Commissioners in Move Lambasted as ‘Corruption Plain and Simple’

Two Democratic commissioners for the Federal Trade Commission said they were fired by President Donald Trump on Tuesday.

Alvaro Bedoya and Rebecca Kelly Slaughter revealed Tuesday that the president terminated their positions in what they pointed to as the latest effort to illegally remove his opponents from agencies usually considered independent.

“I am a commissioner at the Federal Trade Commission. The president just illegally fired me,” Bedoya wrote on X as part of a longer statement. “This is corruption plain and simple.”

A White House official confirmed the dismissals on Tuesday but had no further statement for press. Reuters reported that both Bedoya and Slaughter plan to sue the Trump administration to reverse the firings.

“Today the president illegally fired me from my position as a federal trade commissioner, violating the plain language of a statute and clear Supreme Court precedent,” Slaughter added in a statement to media of her own. “Why? Because I have a voice. And he is afraid of what I’ll tell the American people.”

The FTC was created in 1914 to enforce a number of antitrust and consumer protection laws. The committee is made up of five members – three from the sitting president’s party and two from the opposing party. A 1935 Supreme Court ruling upheld a law that FTC commissioners could only be fired for cause, like neglect of duty. The law was passed to help protect the commissioners of the independent regulatory agency from being under control of whoever sat in the White House.

Trump has wilely disregarded the longstanding protections for such presidential appointees and their related departments.

Trump’s move to fire Bedoya and Slaughter came among his widespread efforts to make government cuts across departments and agencies. The president also fired several board members at the Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts while naming himself the new Chairman.

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