Rebecca Kelly Slaughter is currently in a legal fight for her reinstatement in the Federal Trade Commission. In the meantime, she will appear at Canisius University on the evening of Thursday, April 30 to speak as part of the institution’s Frank G. Raichle Lecture Series on Law in American Society.
Slaughter's talk is titled For Cause: On Careers in Public Service and Fighting for Justice.
“I'm going to talk a little bit about both careers in public service, working for causes that you believe in and specifically my career in public service, and also the concept of removal for cause, which is the protections in the statute that enabled enacted the FTC, that commissioners can only be removed for cause, in other words, if they're doing something wrong,” she said.
Slaughter, a Democrat, was appointed to the FTC in 2018 by President Donald Trump. She remained a commissioner through the Biden Administration. Then after Trump returned to the White House, he fired Slaughter on March 18, 2025. The official explanation for her termination was her position on the FTC was “inconsistent with the Administration’s priorities.” But as she was not accused of any wrongdoing, her dismissal was without cause.
Slaughter sued to get reinstated and two courts ruled in her favor. The Trump Administration appealed the latter ruling in September 2025, and took the case to the U.S. Supreme Court. Oral arguments have been presented. Now Slaughter awaits their decision.
But she points to legal precedent, the 1935 Supreme Court decision in Humphrey’s Executor v. United States. It was a case involving William Humphrey, a conservative Republican who sat on the FTC at the time. He was fired by President Franklin D. Roosevelt, a Democrat, over political differences. The high court ruled Roosevelt could not remove Humphrey without specific cause.
“This is not a partisan question. It's not one side or the other. It's about what rules govern us and whether any administration of any political party is going to follow the rules as Congress set them up, or it's just going to act without regard to those rules,” Slaughter said.
When addressing public service, Slaughter told BTPM NPR that this is an incredibly hard time but also an incredibly important time for good people to commit themselves to government service.
“This administration has been very transparent about its assault on the civil service that is really the engine of our government, and therefore our freedom and economic integrity,” she said. “And I think that that's been really, really tragic, because people who devote their lives and their careers and their times to helping their fellow Americans deserve our respect and appreciation, not to be maligned.”
Her talk will begin at 7 p.m. at the Canisius Science Commons, Main Street between Jefferson and East Delavan Avenues. Doors open at 6:30 p.m. Admission is free to the public.
