In a 2-1 vote, a panel of the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals decided to keep in place a temporary restraining order by a lower court judge that prevents Trump from removing Office of Special Counsel chief Hampton Dellinger, an appointee of former President Joe Biden.

FULL LIST OF EXECUTIVE ORDERS, ACTIONS, AND PROCLAMATIONS TRUMP HAS MADE AS PRESIDENT

The Trump administration will likely ask the Supreme Court to weigh in on the scope of Trump’s authority to dismiss top officials across the federal government. 

Biden-appointed judges Florence Pan and J. Michelle Childs ruled against Trump’s authority to fire Dellinger. They made their decision largely based on procedural grounds, noting that the previous decision by U.S. District Court Judge Amy Berman Jackson only restored Dellinger to his position through Feb. 26. According to Pan and Childs, short-term orders are not usually subjected to appeals court reviews. 

“It is unclear how the district court could make an independent ruling on the preliminary injunction motion or the merits of the case if we prejudged such a significant issue in advance of the February 26 hearing,” Pan and Childs wrote. “In short, a decision by this court to opine on substantial legal issues at this point in the litigation, before the district court has finished its work and issued a ruling on the preliminary injunction, would throw a monkey wrench into the district court proceedings.”

Meanwhile, Trump-appointee Greg Katsas, who served as a top attorney in the White House Counsel’s Office during Trump’s first administration, said Jackson’s directive greatly interfered with the powers of the president.

“The extraordinary character of the order at issue here — which directs the President to recognize and work with an agency head whom he has already removed — warrants immediate appellate review,” Katsas wrote.

Last week, the same panel of the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals voted against the Justice Department’s attempt to prevent Jackson’s order to restore Dellinger to his post.