alt Hacker News> if the law defines how an agency is staffed and makes policy
Strongly contingent upon this, right? Wasn't the whole "administrative state" / "Chevron deference" argument that Congress did the bare minimum in defining what an executive agency is supposed to do, left it up to the executive to direct it as it sees fit? And worse, the supposedly apolitical career civil servants in charge of these agencies may from time to time thwart the will of the democratically elected head of the executive?
Where is the people's recourse then?
The original Chevron ruling was an expansion of executive branch power; it said courts should give “deference” to agencies in matters where Congress was not specific—usually in detailed findings of fact and definition of regulations, the work of the agency. Congress usually is specific about structure and governance.
The recent decision to formally overturn this precedent was a reduction in power for the executive branch, since it greatly expanded the scope of when a judge could overrule agencies. However, judges were mostly already doing this, so the big headline ruling was more like a funeral than a murder.