The Supreme Court has postponed its decision on whether President Trump can fire the top copyright official in the United States, the Hill reported.

Justice Clarence Thomas said he would have granted the White House's emergency request to immediately fire Shira Perlmutter, who has led the U.S. Copyright Office since 2020, while the case continues.

In their brief order, the justices said they would first decide two related disputes touching on the president's power over so-called independent agency officials. Those cases, concerning the firings of Federal Trade Commissioner Rebecca Slaughter and Federal Reserve Governor Lisa Cook, will be heard in early December and January, respectively.

Separation of powers

A district court allowed for Perlmutter's removal, but a divided, 2-1 panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit reversed and ordered Perlmutter's reinstatement. Two Biden-appointed circuit judges comprised the majority.

“In a system of checked and balanced power, the Executive has no authority to punish a Legislative Branch official for the advice that she provides to Congress,” Judge Florence Pan wrote.

The Copyright Office is housed within the Library of Congress. The Trump administration argues that both the Register of Copyrights and the Librarian of Congress are part of the Executive Branch, and the president may fire either.

"Treating the Librarian and Register as legislative officers would set much of federal copyright law on a collision course with the basic principle that Congress may not vest the power to execute the laws in itself or its officers," the administration wrote in its petition to the Supreme Court.

"Inexcusable mess"

Trump fired Perlmutter and the Librarian of Congress in May and replaced the Librarian, who did not fight her removal, with Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche. Perlmutter's firing came one day after she released a report, which the Trump administration allegedly disagreed with, concerning the use of copyrighted materials for AI training.

Her lawyers alleged to the Supreme Court that the White House is making "an inexcusable mess of Congress’s plans for the governance of its library,” and is demanding “an unprecedented expansion of executive power.”

“We are pleased that the Court deferred the government’s motion to stay our court order in a case that is critically important for rule of law, the separation of powers and the independence of the Library of Congress,” Skye Perryman, president and CEO of Democracy Forward, the left-leaning legal group representing Perlmutter, said in a statement.

Judicial interference?

The Supreme Court has been generally sympathetic to Trump in his various battles with lower courts over the firings of government officials. In the recent case Trump v. Wilcox, the justices wrote that the "Government faces greater risk of harm from an order allowing a removed officer to continue exercising the executive power than a wrongfully removed officer faces from being unable to perform her statutory duty."

In their brief to the Supreme Court, the administration called the copyright case another instance of "improper judicial interference" with Trump's power to fire officials who wield executive power.

Solicitor General John D. Sauer said U.S. Circuit Judge Justin Walker, a Trump appointee who dissented from the D.C. Circuit's ruling, correctly understood how court precedent applies to the case.

"As Judge Walker’s dissent observed, the [D.C. Circuit's] analysis contravenes settled precedent and misconceives the Librarian’s and Register’s legal status... The Librarian and Register exercise powers that this Court has repeatedly classified as executive, such as the power to issue rules implementing a federal statute, to issue orders in administrative adjudications, and even to conduct foreign relations relating to copyright issues," Sauer wrote.