Latest news with #ConsumerSafety
CBS News
27-05-2025
- Business
- CBS News
Maryland judge denies request to allow fired federal employees to work during pending lawsuit
A Maryland judge denied a request that would allow three former Consumer Product Safety Commissioners to return to work while the case is litigated in court. President Joe Biden's appointees Richard Trumka, Mary Boyle, and Alexander Hoehn-Saric were informed of their removal earlier this month. A Maryland judge denied a request that would allow three former Consumer Product Safety Commissioners to return to work while the case is litigated in court. CBS News The three former federal workers claim in a lawsuit that President Trump illegally fired them without cause. They sought a temporary restraining order and a preliminary injunction that would allow them to continue working, which was turned down on Tuesday. The CPSC is an independent agency that regulates the safety of consumer products, from toys to appliances. It's the group that often handles recalls of items such as kitchen ranges that can set fires and steam cleaners that have burned users. It is bipartisan and comprises five commissioners who serve for staggered seven-year terms. Does there need to be a cause for firings? The case questions whether the president can fire members of an independent board created by Congress. Attorneys for the fired commissioners say the president can't fire them without cause, and there must be neglect or maleficence. "At no point has the administration alleged any neglect of duty or malfeasance in office," said Nicolas Sansone, an attorney with Public Citizen Litigation Group who is representing the former commissioners. Attorneys for the commissioners argued the CPSC falls under an exception in a 1935 Supreme Court ruling. In that case, Humphreys' Executor v. United States, the high court found that Congress could impose for-cause removal protections to multi-member commissions of experts that are balanced along partisan lines and do not exercise any executive power. Can Trump authorize firings of CPSC commissioners? Attorneys for the Trump administration argue he has the executive power to remove people in those positions. It also argued it would be more harmful to continually bring back and let go of these officials during litigation. Earlier this month, CBS News reported that White House spokeswoman Karoline Leavitt said that the CPSC falls under the executive branch, giving the president the right to fire employees there. Speaking out against the removals On May 14, the fired commissioners joined Senators in speaking out against their removal. Trumka says the commission issued 333 recalls last year on 150 million products. He believes he was fired after advancing a solution on lithium-ion batteries, refusing to let DOGE review records, and saying the commission wouldn't allow their staff to be fired. Now, he isn't sure the work is being done to protect the public. "We've pushed hard to protect your families as much as we protect our own. For that, we were illegally fired," Trumka said on May 14. "When we win and we're put back into our jobs. I can't wait to get back to that work, because I want to follow through on our commitments that we've made to deliver safety rules for all of you this year." Supreme Court takes on a similar case The Supreme Court allowed President Trump to remove two members of federal independent labor boards while legal proceedings over their firings move forward last week. The high court granted a request for emergency relief from the Trump administration to pause a pair of lower court rulings that voided Trump's removals of Gwynne Wilcox from the National Labor Relations Board and Cathy Harris from the Merit Systems Protection Board. "Because the Constitution vests the executive power in the President, he may remove without cause executive officers who exercise that power on his behalf, subject to narrow exceptions recognized by our precedents," the court said. "The stay reflects our judgment that the Government is likely to show that both the NLRB and MSPB exercise considerable executive power. But we do not ultimately decide in this posture whether the NLRB or MSPB falls within such a recognized exception; that question is better left for resolution after full briefing and argument." It also said the continuous removal and reinstatement of officials during litigation would be "disruptive". DOGE firings DOGE has sought to cut federal workers in the name of reducing fraud, waste and abuse. But many of its firings have had to be reversed, either because the group mistakenly fired essential workers — like bird-flu experts with the U.S. Department of Agriculture — or after a court ruled the dismissals were illegal. DOGE's savings have largely been wiped out by costs related to those issues as well as lost productivity, according to a recent analysis by the Partnership for Public Service, a nonpartisan nonprofit that focuses on the federal workforce. The CPSC firings come after the Trump administration dismissed other officials at independent agencies, including the vice chair of the National Transportation Safety Board this week and a member of the National Labor Relations Board in January.
CNN
09-05-2025
- Business
- CNN
Trump fires Democratic-appointed Consumer Product Safety commissioners
President Donald Trump on Thursday fired at least two members of the Consumer Product Safety Commission, the agency that creates safety requirements and issues recalls for consumer products, the commissioners said in statements. The move comes as the Trump administration is facing legal scrutiny over its efforts to permanently fire board members at independent agencies. The fired CPSC commissioners, Richard Trumka Jr. and Alexander Hoehn-Saric, were nominated by former President Joe Biden and confirmed by the Senate in 2021 for terms that were supposed to last seven years. Trumka said he received a visit from the Department of Government Efficiency on Thursday, alongside a request for approval to bring two DOGE members to the agency, which he didn't allow. He got an email shortly thereafter telling him he had been fired. 'On behalf of President Donald J. Trump, I am writing to inform you that your position on the Consumer Product Safety Commission is terminated effective immediately. Thank you for your service,' reads the email, which CNN has obtained. Trumka said the email didn't explain why he was being fired. 'Of course, he did not give any reason why. However, it immediately follows me doing two things that this Administration is against: (1) advancing solutions to protect the American people from harm, and (2) stopping the illegal firing of scores of public servants who do lifesaving work,' Trumka said in a statement Friday. Trumka has made it clear he plans on challenging the move in court, writing Trump 'did not have the authority to fire me.' 'I have a set term on this independent, bipartisan Commission that does not expire until October of 2028, and I will continue protecting the American people from harm through that time,' Trumka wrote. 'The President would like to end this nation's long history of independent agencies, so he's chosen to ignore the law and pretend independence doesn't exist. I'll see him in court.' He warned that if his 'illegal firing is allowed to stand, it will clear the way for the Administration and its lapdogs to cripple the lifesaving functions of this agency to benefit their wealthy donors.' Hoehn-Saric was the chair of the commission until January, after which he became a commissioner. In a statement posted on social media, he described the terminations as 'part of the Trump Administration's ongoing attack on federal agencies and federal workers to the detriment of the American public.' White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt on Friday appeared to defend Trump's decision to fire the officials when asked about the dismissals. 'It's a federal agency within which branch? It's the executive branch. Who's the head of the executive branch? The president of the United States. He has the right to fire people within the executive branch. It's a pretty simple answer,' Leavitt said. Consumer Reports, a nonprofit that helps consumers evaluate goods and services, condemned the move on Friday and called for Congress to defend CPSC. 'This is an appalling and lawless attack on the independence of our country's product safety watchdog. Anyone who cares about keeping their family safe should oppose this move and demand that it be reversed,' said William Wallace, director of safety advocacy for Consumer Reports. The Supreme Court is set to weigh in on whether the president has the authority to permanently fire board members at two similar independent agencies — the National Labor Relations Board and the Merit Systems Protection Board. The commissioners are the latest public servants to be removed from their positions during Trump's second term. The White House on Thursday notified Librarian of Congress Carla Hayden that she would be fired, while not making the reason for her removal immediately clear. CNN's Betsy Klein contributed to this report.
