President Donald Trump has actually relocated to fire Democratic members of 2 independent federal commissions, a remarkable break from years of legal precedent that guarantees to hand Republicans control over boards that supervise swaths of U.S. employees, employers and labor unions.

On Monday night, he dismissed 2 of the 3 Democrats on the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission - Jocelyn Samuels and Charlotte Burrows, formerly the chair, employment the White House confirmed Tuesday. He also fired the chair of the National Labor Relations Board, Gwynne Wilcox, a Democrat, an NLRB spokesperson validated Tuesday.

All 3 said they are exploring their legal options against the administration - cases that legal scholars say could reach as far as the Supreme Court.

Trump likewise eliminated the EEOC's basic counsel, Karla Gilbride, who oversaw civil actions against companies on a variety of concerns, including discrimination claims from LGBTQ+ and pregnant workers. And he terminated Jennifer Abruzzo, the NLRB's basic counsel. Their departures throw into question the status of various actions underway at both firms, consisting of against billionaire Elon Musk's electric cars and truck company, Tesla.

"These were far-left appointees with radical records of overthrowing long-standing labor law, and they have no place as senior appointees in the Trump administration, which was given a mandate by the American people to reverse the radical policies they developed," a White House official said, speaking on the condition of privacy under guideline set by the administration.

In declarations issued Tuesday, Burrows and Samuels both called their removals "extraordinary."

"Removing me from my position before the expiration of my Congressionally directed term is unmatched, breaks the law, and represents an essential misunderstanding of the nature of the EEOC as an independent company - one that is not managed by a single Cabinet secretary but runs as a multimember body whose varying views are baked into the Commission's style," Samuels wrote.

In dismissing her, she included, the White House critiqued her views on sex discrimination, diversity, equity and addition (DEI) programs, employment and ease of access problems. She said the criticism misinterpreted "the fundamental principles of equivalent job opportunity."

Burrows composed that her elimination "will undermine the efforts of this independent agency to do the important work of protecting employees from discrimination, supporting employers' compliance efforts, and broadening public awareness and understanding of federal employment laws."

Wilcox, the NLRB member, wrote in a declaration that she will pursue "all legal opportunities to challenge my removal, which violates enduring Supreme Court precedent."

The removal of basic counsels is not without precedent: President Joe Biden fired Trump-appointed general counsels at the EEOC and NLRB upon entering workplace in 2021. Yet dismissing members of independent commissions represents a dramatic break from Supreme Court precedent dating to 1935, which holds that the president can not eliminate members of independent agencies such as the EEOC other than in cases of disregard of responsibility, impropriety or inadequacy.

Trump's actions leave both five-member boards without enough members to carry out company. The boards now have just two members; Trump should fill the jobs and wait for Senate approval.

Legal professionals were troubled by Trump's move.

There are "concerns that this is the primary step toward erosion of work environment securities against discrimination in the workplace," said Kevin Owen, a work attorney in Maryland focusing on federal workers.

"This may declare the end of the EEOC as we understand it."

Trump has embraced an expansive view of executive power and campaigned on taking more control over agencies that generally ran mainly independent of the White House, including the EEOC and NLRB. His maneuvers also bring into question whether he will take similar actions at other independent companies.

"I will bring the independent regulatory companies such as the [Federal Communications Commission] and the [Federal Trade Commission] back under presidential authority as the Constitution needs," Trump composed on his social media platform, Truth Social, in April 2023. "These agencies do not get to become a fourth branch of federal government, providing rules and edicts all on their own, and that's what they've been doing."

Taking control of the companies might enable Trump to more aggressively pursue his agenda.

The dismissal of the 2 Democratic EEOC commissioners - Samuels and Burrows - allows Trump to change them with Republicans and provide the five-member commission a conservative bulk. One seat was vacant before the terminations.

Last week, Trump appointed Andrea Lucas, the board's only Republican, as acting chair. With a GOP majority, Lucas would have the ability to more freely pursue her top priorities, that include "rooting out unlawful DEI-motivated race and sex discrimination" and "protecting the biological and binary truth of sex." The EEOC has the power to open examinations and pursue civil charges against companies it declares have broken federal laws barring workplace discrimination.

Trump's firing of the NLRB's Wilcox endangers long-standing union rights in the United States enforced by the NLRB, legal professionals said.

"This has the potential to result in rulings that either change the method the [labor] board is structured or perhaps restrict the board's capability to function going forward," stated Kate Andrias, a teacher at Columbia Law School.

The NLRB - which oversees unionization votes by employees and of unlawful union busting - has actually faced a flurry of legal challenges to its constitutionality, brought last year by SpaceX, Amazon and other prominent business, emboldened by a conservative Supreme Court. (Amazon founder Jeff Bezos owns The Washington Post.) Those cases are slowly overcoming the federal court system. But legal experts state Wilcox's shooting could propel the problem to the high court faster.

"The Trump administration in addition to the designers of Project 2025 are intending to do away with the National Labor Relations Act," said Seth Goldstein, a labor lawyer who has actually represented Amazon and employment Trader Joe's workers. He described the 1935 law that established the NLRB and modern-day union rights. "They desire to end employee rights and return us to the Gilded Age," he said.