Supreme Court Chief Justice Roberts swoops in to save Trump firing decision

Supreme Court Chief Justice John Roberts on Wednesday agreed to temporarily halt the reinstatement of two fired federal board members, delivering another near-term win to President Donald Trump as his administration continues to spar in federal courts over the extent of his executive branch powers.

The brief stay handed down by Roberts is not a final ruling on the reinstatement of the two board members, National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) member Gwynne Wilcox and Merit Systems Protection Board (MSPB) member Cathy Harris – two Democratic appointees who were abruptly terminated by the Trump administration earlier this year. 

Both had challenged their terminations as "unlawful" in separate suits filed in D.C. federal court.

But the order from Roberts does temporarily halt their reinstatements from taking force two days after a federal appeals court voted en banc to reinstate them.

APPEALS COURT BLOCKS TRUMP FROM FIRING FEDERAL BOARD MEMBERS, TEES UP SUPREME COURT FIGHT

National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) member Gwynne Wilcox and Merit Systems Protection Board (MSPB) member Cathy Harris sued the administration after they were terminated from their posts. (NLRB; AP Photo; US District Court)

Judges for the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit voted 7-4 Monday to restore Wilcox and Harris to their respective boards, citing Supreme Court precedent in Humphrey’s Executor and Wiener v. United States as the backing for their decision. 

They noted that the Supreme Court had never overturned or reversed the decades-old precedent regarding removal restrictions for government officials of "multimember adjudicatory boards" – including the NLRB and MSPB. "The Supreme Court has repeatedly told the courts of appeals to follow extant Supreme Court precedent unless and until that Court itself changes it or overturns it," judges noted in their opinion. 

Monday's ruling from the full panel was expected to spark intense backlash from the Trump administration, which has lobbed accusations of so-called "activist judges" that have slowed or halted some of Trump's executive orders and actions.

The Trump administration appealed the ruling to the Supreme Court almost immediately. 

TRUMP'S AUTHORITY TO FIRE OFFICIALS QUESTIONED IN COURT BATTLE OVER NLRB SEAT

Members of the Supreme Court (L-R) Associate Justices Amy Coney Barrett, Neil M. Gorsuch, Sonia Sotomayor, and Clarence Thomas, Chief Justice John G. Roberts, Jr., and Associate Justices Ketanji Brown Jackson, Samuel A. Alito, Jr., Elena Kagan, and Brett M. Kavanaugh pose in the Justices Conference Room prior to the formal investiture ceremony of Associate Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson September 30, 2022 in Washington, D.C. (Collection of the Supreme Court of the United States via Getty Images)

The en banc decision was the latest in a dizzying flurry of court developments that had upheld, then blocked, and upheld again the firings of the two employees, and came after D.C.-based federal judges had issued orders blocking their terminations. 

"A President who touts an image of himself as a ‘king’ or a ‘dictator,’ perhaps as his vision of effective leadership, fundamentally misapprehends the role under Article II of the U.S. Constitution," U.S. District Judge Beryl Howell, who oversaw Wilcox's case, wrote in her opinion. 

Likewise, U.S. District Judge Rudolph Contreras, who was presiding over Harris's case, wrote that if the President were to "displace independent agency heads from their positions for the length of litigation such as this, those officials’ independence would shatter."

Both opinions cited the 1935 Supreme Court precedent, Humphrey's Executor v. United States, that notably narrowed the president's constitutional power to remove agents of the executive branch, in support of Wilcox's and Harris's reinstatements. 

Back in February, Trump's Justice Department penned a letter to Illinois Democratic Sen. Dick Durbin stating that it was seeking to overturn the landmark case. 

"To the extent that Humphrey's Executor requires otherwise, the Department intends to urge the Supreme Court to overrule that decision, which prevents the President from adequately supervising principal officers in the Executive Branch who execute the laws on the President's behalf, and which has already been severely eroded by recent Supreme Court decisions," Acting Solicitor General Sarah Harris wrote in the letter. 

Back in February, Trump's Justice Department penned a letter to Illinois Democratic Sen. Dick Durbin stating that it was seeking to overturn the landmark case.  (Samuel Corum/Bloomberg via Getty Images, left, and MANDEL NGAN/AFP via Getty Images, right.)

The Trump administration appealed the orders to the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals, where a three-judge panel ruled 2-1 in favor of the Trump administration, allowing the firings to proceed. 

Wilcox and Harris - now as a consolidated case - filed a motion for an en banc hearing, requesting the appeals court hear the case again with the entire bench present. 

In an en banc ruling issued on April 7, the D.C. Circuit voted to block the terminations, reversing the previous appellate holding. 

SUPREME COURT RULES ON STATUS OF TENS OF THOUSANDS OF FIRED PROBATIONARY EMPLOYEES

Hampton Dellinger, a Biden-appointee previously tapped to head the Office of Special Counsel, also sued the Trump administration over his own termination. (U.S. Office of Special Counsel/Handout via REUTERS )

The judges voted 7-4 to restore Wilcox and Harris to their posts. 

Harris's and Wilcox's cases are just several legal challenges in a grander scheme of cases attempting to clearly define the executive's power. 

Hampton Dellinger, a Biden-appointee previously tapped to head the Office of Special Counsel, also sued the Trump administration over his own termination. Dellinger filed suit in D.C. district court after his Feb. 7 firing. 

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He had maintained the argument that, by law, he could only be dismissed from his position for job performance problems, which were not cited in an email dismissing him from his post. 

Dellinger ultimately dropped his suit against the administration after the D.C. appellate court issued an unsigned order siding with the Trump administration. 

Fox News Digital's Breanne Deppisch contributed to this report.