A former Equal Employment Opportunity Commission member suing for reinstatement after being fired by President
Former Democratic EEOC Commissioner Jocelyn Samuels’ lawsuit filed April 9 in D.C. federal court alleges Trump illegally fired her Jan. 27, breaking from Congressional intent and limiting the anti-bias agency’s ability to function.
Trump wasted no time in his second term dismissing officials at independent agencies across the federal government. Leaders from other agencies already sued the administration, but Samuels is the first from the civil rights commission to file a challenge.
“She has a very limited chance of success, because when the EEOC was created, Congress did not specify any restrictions on the ability of the president to remove a commissioner,” said Harold Krent, a professor at the Chicago-Kent College of Law.
The statute that established the EEOC, Title VII of the 1964 Civil Rights Act, doesn’t include explicit removal protections.
That omission contrasts with other agencies’ foundational statutes like the National Labor Relations Act, which federal labor board member Gwynne Wilcox cites in her suit challenging her own firing by Trump. The NLRA says board members may be removed by the president only “for neglect of duty or malfeasance in office.”
US Chief Justice John Roberts let Trump temporarily remove Wilcox and Merit Systems Protection Board member Cathy Harris from their role April 19. The president made the emergency request after a federal appeals court said the officials could stay in their jobs as their litigation over their firings continues.
Wilcox’s case tests the US Supreme Court’s 1935 ruling in Humphrey’s Executor v. US, which upheld for-cause job protections for Federal Trade Commission members, establishing limits to prevent presidents from removing members of quasi-legislative and quasi-judicial bodies.
A 2020 decision in Seila Law v. Consumer Financial Protection Bureau expanded the president’s authority to remove some agency heads, but didn’t address removal protections for multi-member commissions like the EEOC.
Removal Protections
Humphrey’s Executor is less “front and center” in Samuels’ case than Wilcox’s because Title VII lacks language widely viewed as providing commissioners removal protections, said Jane Manners, an assistant professor at Temple University Beasley School of Law.
However, Manners said she is in the minority that views Congress’s decisions to omit language about the president’s ability to remove an EEOC commissioner for only “neglect of duty or malfeasance” to indicate that Congress didn’t give the president power to dismiss the members at all.
“To me, this is a tragedy, that this understanding has been lost, because you’ve got these agencies where independence is of critical importance, and this argument is not even being made that the statute means absolute independence, absolute unremovability,” she said.
Samuels’ complaint still echoes Humphrey’s Executor by arguing Congress’s intent to protect commissioners is reflected in the structure of the agency.
It states Congress established the EEOC to be a bipartisan, five-member entity, served by members in staggered five-year terms, and further stresses Congress’s intent by citing a 1972 amendment with a “Holdover Clause” that allows commissioners to largely continue to serve until a successor is appointed.
“She’s saying the [statute] doesn’t have explicit provisions that would allow for her removal, and invites the court to read into the statute protections from being removed by the fact that Congress designed the appointments to be for a fixed term,” said Andrew Scroggins, an employment attorney at Seyfarth Shaw LLP.
The complaint also highlights quasi-legislative and quasi-judicial functions the agency undertakes, like issuing guidance about federal discrimination law and adjudicating federal sector discrimination claims.
Humphrey’s Executor asserted that these types of non-executive functions set certain agencies apart from the president, shielding their officials from at-will dismissal by the White House.
Conflicting Views
The administration’s email firing Samuels cited a joint statement she issued with other Democratic commissioners disagreeing with Trump’s executive orders limiting diversity programs and gender identity protections, according to the complaint.
The lawsuit aims to show any conflicting views Samuels expressed are “part of the normal back and forth among commissioners,” and tries to connect the statements in the email to her case that she was removed for an “improper purpose,” Scroggins said.
In response to Samuels’ lawsuit, White House spokesperson Harrison Fields said the “Constitution gives President Trump the power to remove personnel who don’t align with his America-first agenda.”
Samuels said in her complaint Trump also impeded the agency’s ability to enforce anti-discrimination laws by firing her and former EEOC Chair Charlotte Burrows, leaving the agency without a three-member quorum.
The EEOC lost a quorum twice in the last 17 years, in 2008 and 2019. But Trump’s actions to outright fire commissioners is unprecedented in the agency’s history. It also eliminated the majority Democrats would have had on the panel until 2026.
One claim Samuels could raise, albeit through “untrodden earth,” is whether Trump’s failure to quickly name replacements for commissioners is a way to “disable” the EEOC “indirectly,” Krent said.
But Samuels’ points suggesting the administration seeks to disrupt the commission’s work don’t advance her argument about why she can’t be removed before the end of her term, Scroggins said.
Samuels’ ability to prove she is protected from at-will dismissal may hit even bigger snags as Wilcox’s case is fast-tracked at a Supreme Court signaling a will to overturn Humphrey’s Executor without waiting on a lower DC appeals panel.
A win for Wilcox at the high court would not be dispositive for Samuels’ case, given Title VII doesn’t address at-will firings. But a loss could weaken her chances.
“My suspicion is that the court will decide the first of the cases to reach it, and in that decision try to articulate some principles that will give guidance to deciding other cases that relate to the removal of agency officials,” Scroggins said.
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