Legal Aid at Work Denounces President Trump’s Overreach in Removing EEOC Commissioners and an NLRB Board Member

January 29, 2025

Legal Aid at Work is outraged by the Trump administration’s unprecedented, late-night firings on January 27 of former EEOC Chair Charlotte Burrows, EEOC Commissioner Jocelyn Samuels, and Acting NLRB Chair Gwynne Wilcox, years before their Presidential appointments were set to expire.

These blatantly politically motivated purges ousted three outstanding public servants who had in common a deep commitment to the vigorous enforcement of workplace rights, including the rights of employees to be free from discrimination and harassment and to organize collectively for their common benefit. Not incidentally, their terminations—all of doubtful legality—also deprived both the EEOC and NLRB of a quorum of members necessary to conduct the agencies’ important work.

By firing Burrows, Samuels and Wilcox, Donald Trump has firmly placed his thumb on the employer side of the scale, undermining the missions of these bipartisan independent agencies and threatening years of progress in protecting the rights of all workers.

Legal Aid at Work will not allow these actions to go unchallenged. We stand with workers and allies in the fight to protect civil and workplace rights and will explore every available avenue to ensure that the EEOC and NLRB remain an effective force for justice.

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