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Supreme Court and Fed
The Supreme Court said Monday that President Donald Trump can fire leaders of independent agencies with one exception, ruling that central banker Lisa Cook can keep her job at the Federal Reserve for now.
“central banker Lisa Cook can keep her job at the Federal Reserve for now”
The justices also said states can count late-arriving mailed ballots, rejecting a Trump-led challenge, and they declined to consider Trump’s push to toss a $5 million jury verdict that he sexually abused writer E. Jean Carroll.
In the same final-week term focused on executive power, the court turned away Trump defender Alan Dershowitz ’s effort to rewrite the U.S. libel law standards.
In a separate development tied to the administration’s energy policy, the Interior Department’s $129 million deal to buy back a North Carolina offshore wind lease from Duke Energy brought the total amount spent on these agreements to about $2.7 billion, according to Newsday.
Housing bill stalls
House Speaker Mike Johnson sent a bipartisan housing bill to President Donald Trump on Monday, kicking off a 10-day countdown for the bill to become law even if Trump does not sign it, according to CNN.
Trump remained undecided over whether he’d sign the measure, saying shortly after Johnson sent it that it was “so unimportant” compared with his efforts to secure a controversial overhaul of federal elections.
Johnson transmitted the housing affordability bill to the White House, while a source familiar with the matter said Trump is unlikely to sign it and that he “could always have a change of heart,” CNN reported.
The housing bill is the “21st Century Road to Housing Act,” and it aims to tackle the country’s affordability crisis primarily through encouraging more housing supply, with a first-of-its-kind limit on private equity by prohibiting large investors from buying single-family homes, CNN said.
What happens next
The Hill reported that Johnson said he would send the bipartisan housing bill passed overwhelmingly by both chambers to President Trump on Monday, and he said, “I’m going to send the bill over to him on Monday, and it will become law.”
““I’m going to send the bill over to him on Monday, and it will become law,” Johnson said”
The Hill also described two ways a bill can become federal law without the president’s signature: Congress can override a presidential veto by a two-thirds vote in both chambers, or the president can simply take no action for ten days while Congress stays in session.
KTEN reported that Trump canceled a signing ceremony on June 24 and prioritized an anti-voting bill that lacks the support to pass, while Trump on Monday called the housing measure “It’s a yawn.”
As the 10-day countdown begins, KTEN said Trump would not veto the bill either and would allow it to become law after the 10 days, even as the White House and congressional Republicans weigh what to do next.
