Trump's authority to fire officials questioned in court battle over NLRB seat

U.S. District Judge Beryl Howell ordered Thursday that NLRB member Gwynne Wilcox be reinstated after she had been fired by Trump earlier this year. Wilcox filed suit in D.C. federal court, arguing that her termination violates the congressional statute delineating NLRB appointments and removals. 

In her Thursday opinion, Howell had some harsh words for the president, writing that his "interpretation of the scope of his constitutional power - or, more aptly, his aspiration - is flat wrong."

"At issue in this case is the President's insistence that he has authority to fire whomever he wants within the Executive branch, overriding any congressionally mandated law in his way," Howell wrote. 

"My fight to stay on the job was not for me, but rather for the ideal that OSC should be as Congress intended: an independent watchdog and a safe, trustworthy place for whistleblowers to report wrongdoing and be protected from retaliation," Dellinger said in a statement released Thursday. 

Dellinger's announcement was preceded by a D.C. appellate court's Wednesday holding that sided with the Trump administration. 

The court issued an unsigned order pausing a lower court order that had reinstated Dellinger to his post. 

Dellinger said in his announcement that he believes the circuit judges "erred badly" in their Wednesday decision, saying that it "immediately erases the independence Congress provided for my position."

"And given the circuit court's adverse ruling, I think my odds of ultimately prevailing before the Supreme Court are long," Dellinger said. "Meanwhile, the harm to the agency and those who rely on it caused by a Special Counsel who is not independent could be immediate, grievous, and, I fear, uncorrectable."

Similar to Wilcox, Dellinger sued the Trump administration in D.C. federal court after his Feb. 7 firing. 

Fox News' Jake Gibson, Bill Mears, Shannon Bream, and David Spunt contributed to this report.