The head of the Federal Trade Commission reiterated arguments on Wednesday that President Donald Trump did not overstep his constitutional authorities when he fired two of the FTC’s Democratic commissioners.

FTC Chairman Andrew Ferguson, a Republican, said he is “firmly of the view that [Trump] had the authority” to fire Commissioners Alvaro Bedoya and Rebecca Kelly Slaughter on March 18. 

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“Independent agencies [are] not good for a democracy,” Ferguson said during an appearance at Y Combinator’s Little Tech Competition Summit. “All powerful executive branch officials should be accountable to the people on whose behalf we are governing, and the only person in the executive branch that gets elected is the president.” 

Under the FTC Act, commissioners are not allowed to be removed for political or policy reasons. Commissioners may only be fired due to instances of “inefficiency, neglect of duty, or malfeasance in office.”

Bedoya and Slaughter filed a lawsuit after they received an email from Trump notifying them of their termination. The message said the two commissioners’ “continued service on the FTC is inconsistent with my Administration’s priorities.”

The pair argued that Trump’s action violated a 1935 Supreme Court decision handed down after President Franklin D. Roosevelt similarly tried to fire a commissioner.

Ferguson has argued otherwise, issuing a statement immediately after the firings that said he had “no doubts” about Trump’s “constitutional authority to remove Commissioners, which is necessary to ensure democratic accountability for our government.” 

TRUMP FIRES TWO DEMOCRATIC FTC COMMISSIONERS

Bedoya and Slaughter’s case could be taken up by the Supreme Court for the justices to reconsider the 1935 precedent set in Humphrey’s Executor v. United States, according to legal experts. 

A recent court ruling gave Trump expanded powers to assert control over independent agencies, setting a legal precedent for the administration to fire personnel from such entities. A federal appeals court in Washington, D.C., ruled Friday that Trump could remove commissioners from the National Labor Relations Board and the Merit Systems Protection Board after two fired NLRB and MSPB members sued his administration for firing them.