Labor & Employment Law Daily Wrap Up, LITIGATION NEWS, TRENDS—DNC, DSCC, and DCC sue Trump Administration over impact of EO 14215, (Mar 3, 2025)
Organizations Mentioned:Federal Election Commission
By Brandi O. Brown, J.D.
The Democratic campaign committees allege that the EO would allow the President, who is head of the Republican Party, to “dictate to the Commission a legal interpretation of the FECA’s provisions” that could be dispositive in proceedings before the Commission.
The Democratic National Committee (DNC), along with the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee (DSCC), and the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee, filed suit in D.C. federal court under the Federal Election Campaign Act (FECA) against the Trump Administration on Friday alleging that Executive Order 14215 of February 18, 2025, titled “Ensuring Accountability for All Agencies,” violates that law, as amended in 1974.
Watergate. After first invoking memories of the 1972 Watergate scandal that led to creation of the Federal Election Commission, the DNC, DSCC, and DCCC allege in their complaint that the “abrupt departure from the statutory scheme” created by the order is an “unprecedented assertion of presidential power” and threatens them with significant harm.
The committees have identified these key points from the lawsuit:
“As applied to the Commission, Executive Order 14215 would eliminate [the Federal Election Campaign Act’s] requirement that the executive branch’s legal interpretations of FECA’s provisions reflect the bipartisan consensus of an expert multimember board and replace that bipartisan consensus with the judgment of a single partisan political figure—the President of the United States.”
“The assertion is incompatible with nearly a century’s worth of Supreme Court precedent blessing Congress’s authority to insulate certain agencies and officials from day-to-day control by the President.”
“As the Supreme Court has held for 90 years […] Congress possesses the authority to insulate from presidential micromanagement agencies that are led by a multimember, bipartisan board that performs quasi-judicial and quasi-legislative functions—that is, agencies like the FEC.”
“Congress’s authority is especially true in this context, where the credibility of the entire regulatory enterprise would be fatally undermined if the party controlling the White House can unilaterally structure campaign rules and adjudicate disputes to disadvantage its electoral competitors.”
Seek certification. The plaintiffs urged the court to “certify the question of FECA’s constitutionality to the en banc D.C. Circuit under 52 U.S.C. § 30110,” and then to “declare that FECA’s provisions shielding FEC decisionmaking from presidential coercion or control are constitutionally valid and enjoin the application of Section 7 of Executive Order 14215 to the Commission as inconsistent with those provisions.” They made a speedy hearing request under Rule 57.
The case is No. 25-587.
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