Supreme Court Declines to Review Trump’s Firing of Labor Board Member Gwynne Wilcox
The Supreme Court on Monday declined to hear former NLRB member Gwynne Wilcox's challenge to her 2025 firing by President Trump, leaving in place an appeals court ruling that upheld the dismissal.
The U.S. Supreme Court on Monday declined to hear a bid by former National Labor Relations Board member Gwynne Wilcox to challenge her firing by President Donald Trump, leaving in place a lower court’s ruling that the dismissal was a valid exercise of presidential power.
The justices turned away Wilcox’s appeal of a decision by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit, which ruled 2-1 in December 2025 that Trump’s January 2025 firing of Wilcox was constitutional. The court’s refusal to take the case brings the legal challenge to an end.
Wilcox, a Democrat appointed by former President Joe Biden, was the first Black woman to serve on the labor board. She was serving a second five-year term, which began in 2023, when Trump moved to fire her about a week into his second term. She sued to challenge the dismissal.
A reversal for a 90-year-old precedent
The court’s action followed its June decision backing Trump’s firing of Rebecca Slaughter, a Democratic member of the Federal Trade Commission. That ruling overturned the court’s 1935 precedent in a case called Humphrey’s Executor, which had recognized the authority of Congress to protect leaders of certain regulatory agencies from removal by the president at will, according to Reuters.
Wilcox’s case had taken a different path at first. U.S. District Judge Beryl Howell ruled in March 2025 that a federal law protecting NLRB officials from being fired without cause was valid, rejecting Trump’s argument that the law encroached on the president’s constitutional authority. The appeals court reversed that ruling in December 2025.
The fight over Wilcox’s firing became a closely watched test of Trump’s drive to bring federal agencies Congress designed to be independent under his direct control. Reuters reported that the firing was part of a wider shakeup of the federal government that included firing thousands of workers, dismantling agencies, installing loyalists in leadership jobs and purging career officials.
Reporting based on coverage by Reuters.
