Comment by g-b-r
1 year ago
Again, they're accountable to the laws that regulate them and the judicial system, in their every action.
It's something extremely common in normal democracies, and if it's really antithetical to US civics, that's just another proof that the US were only a pretence of a democratic system.
Also, they're run by people appointed by elected officials, just like any other government agency. They serve according to laws passed by the people's representatives and signed by the president, and they can be removed from their positions according to the law, as well. The theory that all executive authority must stem from the president's will and be subject to his whim is novel, monarchical, and highly dangerous.
And those laws make them accountable in explicitly specified manner to the President, who is empowered to remove them, but only for enumerated causes.
If it's so they're hardly independent agencies, and the point of this executive order is indeed to eliminate the independence.
No because "independent agency" just mean the agency was established by law, with a specific mandate and regulations that the President can't independently change.
It doesn't mean the agency isn't a part of the Executive branch with the President at it's head and it doesn't mean the President can't fire them for specific reasons.
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