President Trump fired the two remaining Democratic members of the Election Assistance Commission on Thursday, leaving the bipartisan agency with no sitting commissioners months before the 2026 midterm elections. Republican commissioner Christy McCormick resigned the same day.
The White House confirmed the removals of commissioners Benjamin Hovland and Thomas Hicks to The Hill, citing the president's authority under a recent Supreme Court ruling and framing the move as part of a broader effort to secure American elections.
The firings mark the latest exercise of presidential removal power following the Supreme Court's "Slaughter decision," which determined that the president has the authority to remove members of the Federal Trade Commission. The White House is now applying that precedent to independent commissions well beyond the FTC, a legal theory that has reshaped the balance of power between the executive branch and agencies Congress designed to operate at arm's length.
A White House official laid out the administration's justification in direct terms.
"The President, and head of the Executive Branch, reserves the right to remove individuals that may not be totally aligned with the important task of securing America's elections and ensuring every legal vote is counted."
The official added that the "Slaughter decision gives the President precedence to do so" and described the administration as having worked "across all agencies and local partners to safeguard elections from fraud and abuse, and investing in a strong infrastructure to sustain that mission especially in the midterm elections."
The Supreme Court ruling, issued last month, dealt specifically with the FTC. But the White House has treated it as a green light to remove commissioners across multiple independent agencies. Whether courts will ultimately agree that the decision extends to every bipartisan body Congress has created remains an open legal question, but for now, the administration is moving on that interpretation.
As AP News reported, the EAC had previously declined to change the national voter registration form to require proof of U.S. citizenship, a step Trump had ordered in a March 2025 executive order. The commission's refusal to comply placed it squarely at odds with the president's election security agenda.
Congress created the Election Assistance Commission in 2002 under the Help America Vote Act, a response to the chaos of the 2000 presidential election. The agency helps voters participate in elections, assists state and local officials in administering them, and maintains the national mail voter registration form developed under the National Voter Registration Act of 1993.
The Washington Examiner noted that the EAC also certifies voting systems, distributes election grants, and provides guidance to state and local election officials. With all commissioners now gone, the agency cannot lawfully make decisions affecting how Americans vote, a point raised by Michael Waldman of the Brennan Center for Justice.
Any new commissioners Trump appoints would require Senate confirmation. The president has not yet announced nominees, and the timeline for restoring the commission's operations remains unclear.
The administration's broader posture on election administration extends beyond the EAC. Postmaster General David Steiner announced last month that the U.S. Postal Service will no longer deliver mail ballots in states that refuse to provide sensitive voter data to the federal government. Which states have refused, and what specific data is at issue, has not been publicly detailed.
That decision, combined with Trump's clearing of the Election Assistance Commission, signals a coordinated push to bring election infrastructure under tighter federal oversight and to condition federal cooperation on state compliance with administration priorities.
Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) called the move a "brazen attempt to seize control of our elections before a single vote is cast," as Breitbart reported, and vowed that staffers would "fight this power grab at every turn."
Sen. Mark Warner (D-Va.) said the move "should concern every American, regardless of party."
Sen. Alex Padilla and Rep. Joe Morelle issued a joint statement claiming that "President Trump is trying to dismantle yet another independent guardrail of our democracy designed to keep elections fair and secure."
Former Georgia Lt. Gov. Geoff Duncan, a Republican, told the Washington Examiner that "Donald Trump wants to eliminate oversight of his administration's oversight, and that's what this is about." Duncan's criticism stands out as a rare Republican voice of dissent on the firings.
The EAC firings fit a broader pattern. Trump has moved aggressively to remove members of independent commissions and agencies since the Slaughter ruling, testing the boundaries of presidential authority over bodies that Congress specifically designed to be insulated from White House control.
Fox News reported that Trump also fired Federal Election Commission Chair Ellen Weintraub in late January 2025, sending a letter stating her "removal effective immediately." Weintraub, who had previously called Trump's voter fraud claims "baseless" and "damaging to our democracy" in 2019, contested the firing publicly.
"There's a legal way to replace FEC commissioners, this isn't it. I've been lucky to serve the American people & stir up some good trouble along the way. That's not changing anytime soon."
That earlier removal, reported by Fox News, previewed the legal and political fights now playing out at the EAC. The administration's position is consistent: the president has the constitutional authority to remove executive-branch appointees who resist his policy direction, regardless of whether Congress intended those positions to carry tenure protections.
The Slaughter decision addressed the FTC specifically. Whether its reasoning extends to every independent commission, including one established to administer elections, is a question courts have not yet resolved in the EAC context. The White House is treating the matter as settled. Democrats and some legal scholars disagree.
What is not in dispute is the practical result. The EAC now has zero commissioners. It cannot certify voting systems, issue guidance, or distribute grants until new members are confirmed. The midterms are approaching. And the Senate confirmation process, even under favorable conditions, is not fast.
Trump's decision to clear out the commission rather than simply replace individual members reflects a willingness to accept short-term institutional disruption in exchange for long-term alignment. The administration is betting that voters care more about election integrity, proof of citizenship, clean voter rolls, secure ballots, than they do about preserving the bureaucratic status quo.
Democrats, meanwhile, are framing the firings as an assault on democratic norms. But the EAC's refusal to implement a citizenship verification requirement ordered by the president raises its own question: should unelected commissioners be able to block a lawful executive order on election policy simply because Congress gave them fixed terms two decades ago?
The Supreme Court said no, at least when it comes to the FTC. The White House is applying that answer everywhere it can. And Trump's critics, for all their outrage, have yet to explain why an agency that refused to verify voter citizenship deserves more deference than the elected president who asked it to.
When a commission created to protect election integrity becomes an obstacle to verifying that only citizens vote, the problem isn't the president who noticed, it's the commission that forgot its purpose.
