Supreme Court rejects challenge to CPSC structure for now

The Supreme Court has so far declined to consider the latest attack on the so-called administrative state. On Monday, he upheld a landmark 90-year-old decision that said presidents cannot fire members of the multi-member independent agency except in cases of bad behavior.

The Consumer Product Safety Commission is a multi-member commission whose purpose is to protect the public from injury and death caused by consumer products.

Consumers’ Research, an organization that conducts research on consumer products, sued after the CPSC denied a number of their Freedom of Information Act requests. To challenge this denial, Consumers’ Research challenged the commission’s structure, arguing that the CPSC is unconstitutionally insulated from presidential oversight and control.

The conservative Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals ruled overwhelmingly that the CPSC can exercise “substantial executive power” while insulated from presidential oversight and control. In his opinion, the appeals court relied on a landmark 1935 Supreme Court decision that protected members of “traditional independent agencies” from being fired at will.

In the latest of dozens of recent attacks on the so-called administrative state, Consumers Research argued that the Fifth Circuit adopted a “widely misinterpretation” of the 1935 case. But the government countered that consumer research is not regulated by the CSPC and therefore has no standing to challenge the agency’s structure.

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