Donald Trump has never been big on the word “no.” Courts have taken judicial notice of this fact. So when the Supreme Court went out of its way to issue a little “advisory opinion dicta,” informing the president that even his puppet majority wouldn’t go along with him firing the Federal Reserve Board, it was only a matter of time before Trump did exactly that and dared the Court to resist. And now, we’re here. Earlier today, the Trump administration filed an application asking the Supreme Court to allow him to issue an injunction, allowing him to fire Fed governor Lisa Cook.
Back in May, while deciding another stay boiling down to whether Trump can unilaterally remove NLRB commissioners, in spite of clear protections from politically motivated firings, the Court brushed off the statutory “for cause” provisions, claiming that Article II gave the president the power to fire anyone exercising any executive power. But this ruling, taken to its logical end, authorized the president to fire Federal Reserve Board members, including Chair Jerome Powell. This wasn’t an idle concern, either, as Trump had been whining incessantly about wanting to be rid of Powell and blasting the idiot who appointed him.
Which was actually Trump himself, but this is what happens when someone with clear signs of dementia occupies the Oval Office.
To avoid watching their own blue chip stock portfolios turn into a bundle of NFTs — and to a lesser extent, from their perspective, “destroying the economy” — the conservatives threw in “out of the blue” as Justice Kagan noted in dissent, an advisory carve out for the Fed on the grounds that “The Federal Reserve is a uniquely structured, quasi-private entity that follows in the distinct historical tradition.”
At which point, the White House began plotting how it would grab the Court by the proverbial genitals.
The administration found its test case in Lisa Cook. The Director of the Federal Housing Finance Agency, William Pulte — who has so far done very little “directing of federal housing finance” and a whole lot of “combing the financial records of Trump’s personal enemies looking for typos” — discovered what he claimed were two mortgage applications filled out by Cook that listed two separate properties as a primary residence. Upon investigation, this accusation appears to be false, but Trump didn’t wait for any fact-finding before writing Cook to tell her he was firing her “for cause,” claiming that such a financial screw-up would undermine public trust in an official with power over the economy.
Trump’s Secretary of the Treasury also apparently filed contradictory residence pledges on mortgage documents. His lawyer, the ubiquitous Alex Spiro, denies the report, but given that an unsubstantiated claim against Cook was all it took for Trump to claim an erosion of public trust, the Treasury Secretary still having a job speaks to an arbitrary and capricious executive.
The lower courts have all agreed that Cook should keep her job in the interim, since Trump’s argument that he can fire a Fed governor over this rates between flimsy and none.
In a disingenuous nod to the earlier Court ruling, the brief notes specifically that the administration “does not contest the constitutionality of the Federal Reserve Board’s for-cause removal provision.” Cold comfort, to be sure. There’s an old Winston Churchill story that he once asked a gentlelady if she’d have sex with him for a million pounds. After she said, “yes,” he asked if she would do it for one pound and when she asked if he took her for a whore, he replied that they’d already established what she was and were now haggling over the price. Well, the Chief Justice already knows he’s a whore, so he should recognize this submission as haggling. The administration will live with “for cause” provisions as long as the Supreme Court whittles the standard down to allow any pretext — no matter how minor or remote in time — to count as “for cause.”
If the Court accedes to this request, expect Jay Powell to learn that the administration thinks the Fed’s office renovation “undermines public trust in the agency.” (Fun fact: that renovation budget ballooned because the first Trump administration demanded a design with more marble than the simple steel and glass design the Federal Reserve intended.)
In addition, what type of hearing does the Due Process Clause require? Must the President preside himself, or may he delegate that task to subordinates? Must he hold a formal evidentiary hearing, or does an informal discussion suffice?
Which is all to say, “even if we must respect a ‘for cause’ provision, we reject the notion that the president would be required to defend the claim.” It’s at will employment with extra steps, exactly what the Supreme Court claimed — a few months ago — the history and tradition of the United States did not countenance.
But Article II creates “an energetic, independent Executive,” Trump v. United States, 603 U.S. 593, 642 (2024)—not a subservient Executive that must follow judicially invented procedures even when exercising core executive power.
It’s a glib way to answer this claim, but there’s a reason it’s Article TWO. The Framers’ pretty clearly understood the Constitution to create a limited, subservient Executive constrained by the power of Congress. There may be good justification for a modern society to afford the Executive branch more power than the Framers would’ve envisioned, but it’s a bald-faced lie to claim “Article II” created that spin on the office. But this Supreme Court set that standard, and now we’re living in the wake of those vibes.
Anyway, that’s what this petition is about. Pretending, with one hand, to respect the “for cause” protections insulating the Fed, while using the other hand to demand unfettered executive power.
To back up this argument, Solicitor General Sauer cites… a whole lot of dissents. Indeed, mostly the dissent written by Judge Gregory Katsas in this very case. When he needs to find some actual binding caselaw to cite, he litters the brief with a bunch of cases from the 1800s when Andrew Jackson was still threatening to duel the Supreme Court. Normally, someone intervenes to explain that a brief based on dissents and 19th century precedent (which, notably predates the Fed itself) before that lawyer finishes their summer associate gig — and in any event, before they become Solicitor General of the United States. But here we are.
This is a crisis of the Court’s own making. Had it stuck to precedent and applied the law as the judiciary had recognized it for decades upon decades, it would’ve shut down Trump’s attempt to fire commissioners from all the statutorily established independent agencies and wouldn’t have to be worried about Trump taking over monetary policy and turning the U.S. economy into a carbon copy of Turkey’s.
Though, as Mayor Eric Adams might say, in many ways, Washington D.C. is the Ankara of the America.
But the extremists got greedy. They couldn’t abide by a world where Trump might have to slow down while bulldozing labor rights or consumer protection laws, so they invented a new standard of broad authority and thought they could carve out the one exception they wanted with an aside buried in a shadow docket opinion.
It turns out, that’s not how it works when dealing with someone willing to send a mob into the Capitol when he’s mad about losing an election. They crafted a dubious exemption, and the administration intends to put them to defending the indefensible.
We’re haggling over the price. The Republican justices just received Donald Trump’s one dollar bid.
(Check out the petition on the next page…)
Joe Patrice is a senior editor at Above the Law and co-host of Thinking Like A Lawyer. Feel free to email any tips, questions, or comments. Follow him on Twitter or Bluesky if you’re interested in law, politics, and a healthy dose of college sports news. Joe also serves as a Managing Director at RPN Executive Search.
The post Trump Asks Supreme Court To Pretend It Didn’t Just Tell Him He Can’t Fire The Fed appeared first on Above the Law.
Donald Trump has never been big on the word “no.” Courts have taken judicial notice of this fact. So when the Supreme Court went out of its way to issue a little “advisory opinion dicta,” informing the president that even his puppet majority wouldn’t go along with him firing the Federal Reserve Board, it was only a matter of time before Trump did exactly that and dared the Court to resist. And now, we’re here. Earlier today, the Trump administration filed an application asking the Supreme Court to allow him to issue an injunction, allowing him to fire Fed governor Lisa Cook.
Back in May, while deciding another stay boiling down to whether Trump can unilaterally remove NLRB commissioners, in spite of clear protections from politically motivated firings, the Court brushed off the statutory “for cause” provisions, claiming that Article II gave the president the power to fire anyone exercising any executive power. But this ruling, taken to its logical end, authorized the president to fire Federal Reserve Board members, including Chair Jerome Powell. This wasn’t an idle concern, either, as Trump had been whining incessantly about wanting to be rid of Powell and blasting the idiot who appointed him.
Which was actually Trump himself, but this is what happens when someone with clear signs of dementia occupies the Oval Office.
To avoid watching their own blue chip stock portfolios turn into a bundle of NFTs — and to a lesser extent, from their perspective, “destroying the economy” — the conservatives threw in “out of the blue” as Justice Kagan noted in dissent, an advisory carve out for the Fed on the grounds that “The Federal Reserve is a uniquely structured, quasi-private entity that follows in the distinct historical tradition.”
At which point, the White House began plotting how it would grab the Court by the proverbial genitals.
The administration found its test case in Lisa Cook. The Director of the Federal Housing Finance Agency, William Pulte — who has so far done very little “directing of federal housing finance” and a whole lot of “combing the financial records of Trump’s personal enemies looking for typos” — discovered what he claimed were two mortgage applications filled out by Cook that listed two separate properties as a primary residence. Upon investigation, this accusation appears to be false, but Trump didn’t wait for any fact-finding before writing Cook to tell her he was firing her “for cause,” claiming that such a financial screw-up would undermine public trust in an official with power over the economy.
Trump’s Secretary of the Treasury also apparently filed contradictory residence pledges on mortgage documents. His lawyer, the ubiquitous Alex Spiro, denies the report, but given that an unsubstantiated claim against Cook was all it took for Trump to claim an erosion of public trust, the Treasury Secretary still having a job speaks to an arbitrary and capricious executive.
The lower courts have all agreed that Cook should keep her job in the interim, since Trump’s argument that he can fire a Fed governor over this rates between flimsy and none.
In a disingenuous nod to the earlier Court ruling, the brief notes specifically that the administration “does not contest the constitutionality of the Federal Reserve Board’s for-cause removal provision.” Cold comfort, to be sure. There’s an old Winston Churchill story that he once asked a gentlelady if she’d have sex with him for a million pounds. After she said, “yes,” he asked if she would do it for one pound and when she asked if he took her for a whore, he replied that they’d already established what she was and were now haggling over the price. Well, the Chief Justice already knows he’s a whore, so he should recognize this submission as haggling. The administration will live with “for cause” provisions as long as the Supreme Court whittles the standard down to allow any pretext — no matter how minor or remote in time — to count as “for cause.”
If the Court accedes to this request, expect Jay Powell to learn that the administration thinks the Fed’s office renovation “undermines public trust in the agency.” (Fun fact: that renovation budget ballooned because the first Trump administration demanded a design with more marble than the simple steel and glass design the Federal Reserve intended.)
In addition, what type of hearing does the Due Process Clause require? Must the President preside himself, or may he delegate that task to subordinates? Must he hold a formal evidentiary hearing, or does an informal discussion suffice?
Which is all to say, “even if we must respect a ‘for cause’ provision, we reject the notion that the president would be required to defend the claim.” It’s at will employment with extra steps, exactly what the Supreme Court claimed — a few months ago — the history and tradition of the United States did not countenance.
But Article II creates “an energetic, independent Executive,” Trump v. United States, 603 U.S. 593, 642 (2024)—not a subservient Executive that must follow judicially invented procedures even when exercising core executive power.
It’s a glib way to answer this claim, but there’s a reason it’s Article TWO. The Framers’ pretty clearly understood the Constitution to create a limited, subservient Executive constrained by the power of Congress. There may be good justification for a modern society to afford the Executive branch more power than the Framers would’ve envisioned, but it’s a bald-faced lie to claim “Article II” created that spin on the office. But this Supreme Court set that standard, and now we’re living in the wake of those vibes.
Anyway, that’s what this petition is about. Pretending, with one hand, to respect the “for cause” protections insulating the Fed, while using the other hand to demand unfettered executive power.
To back up this argument, Solicitor General Sauer cites… a whole lot of dissents. Indeed, mostly the dissent written by Judge Gregory Katsas in this very case. When he needs to find some actual binding caselaw to cite, he litters the brief with a bunch of cases from the 1800s when Andrew Jackson was still threatening to duel the Supreme Court. Normally, someone intervenes to explain that a brief based on dissents and 19th century precedent (which, notably predates the Fed itself) before that lawyer finishes their summer associate gig — and in any event, before they become Solicitor General of the United States. But here we are.
This is a crisis of the Court’s own making. Had it stuck to precedent and applied the law as the judiciary had recognized it for decades upon decades, it would’ve shut down Trump’s attempt to fire commissioners from all the statutorily established independent agencies and wouldn’t have to be worried about Trump taking over monetary policy and turning the U.S. economy into a carbon copy of Turkey’s.
Though, as Mayor Eric Adams might say, in many ways, Washington D.C. is the Ankara of the America.
But the extremists got greedy. They couldn’t abide by a world where Trump might have to slow down while bulldozing labor rights or consumer protection laws, so they invented a new standard of broad authority and thought they could carve out the one exception they wanted with an aside buried in a shadow docket opinion.
It turns out, that’s not how it works when dealing with someone willing to send a mob into the Capitol when he’s mad about losing an election. They crafted a dubious exemption, and the administration intends to put them to defending the indefensible.
We’re haggling over the price. The Republican justices just received Donald Trump’s one dollar bid.
(Check out the petition on the next page…)
Joe Patrice is a senior editor at Above the Law and co-host of Thinking Like A Lawyer. Feel free to email any tips, questions, or comments. Follow him on Twitter or Bluesky if you’re interested in law, politics, and a healthy dose of college sports news. Joe also serves as a Managing Director at RPN Executive Search.
