STEP TOO FAR

Judge Stops Trump Firing the Head of Anti-Corruption Office

The independent agency is supposed to be safe from political reprisals so it can protect whistleblowers.

A judge has blocked President Donald Trump from firing the head of the federal office that investigates government corruption and protects whistleblowers.

On Friday, Trump sent a one-sentence email to Hampton Dellinger, who has led the Office of the Special Counsel since March 2024, telling him he was fired, according to a Wednesday night restraining order that temporarily halts the firing.

By law, Dellinger was supposed to serve a five-year term unless removed by the president for “inefficiency, neglect of duty, or malfeasance in office.”

“This language expresses Congress’s clear intent to ensure the independence of the Special Counsel and insulate his work from being buffeted by the winds of political change,” Judge Amy Berman Jackson, who former President Barack Obama appointed, wrote in the order.

The Trump administration didn’t deny firing Dellinger without cause. Instead, it argued the statute limiting the president’s ability to remove the head of special counsel except for cause was unconstitutional.

But Berman Jackson wrote that no court had struck down the law so far, and the Supreme Court has “taken pains to carve the OSC out of its pronouncements concerning the President’s broad authority to remove officials who assist him in discharging his duties at will.”

She had previously issued an order keeping Dellinger in place until Thursday night, and the latest order allows him to keep his job for now while the court considers his case. A hearing was scheduled for Feb. 26.

Dellinger’s job as Special Counsel at the OSC is distinct from that of a Special Counsel appointed by the Department of Justice. The office is an independent agency that gives whistleblowers an avenue to report potential abuse and—crucially—protects them from reprisal. The office also enforces the Hatch Act, which restricts partisan political activity by government employees.

Those responsibilities put Dellinger in a prime position to challenge the Trump administration if the courts continue to block his firing.

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Janna Brancolini

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