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Cook stays, others fall
The U.S. Supreme Court upheld President Donald Trump’s firings of the heads of independent federal agencies while carving out one exception for the Federal Reserve, allowing Fed governor Lisa Cook to keep her job for now as she fights the effort to remove her over allegations of mortgage fraud that she has denied.
In the Cook case, the court voted 5-4 to reject the Trump administration’s effort to get Cook out of her job now, and Chief Justice John Roberts wrote that allowing her removal now would “turn for-cause protection into little more than at-will employment.”
The court said the Fed’s role in setting interest rates meant presidents do not have the same free rein there as they do elsewhere, even as it held that presidents have free rein to fire agency heads at will despite federal laws requiring a cause for such dismissals.
In a separate but related decision, the court upheld Trump’s firings beyond the Federal Reserve, including the case of former Federal Trade Commission member Rebecca Slaughter, whom Trump fired without cause despite a federal law requiring a reason.
The court’s majority jettisoned its unanimous decision in Humphrey’s Executor, which had limited when presidents can fire agency board members, and the Associated Press said the ruling dramatically expanded presidential power.
Roberts, Sotomayor clash
Chief Justice John Roberts wrote for the court that “We hold that such protection from removal is contrary to the separation of powers enshrined in the Constitution,” as the justices ruled that presidents have free rein to fire agency heads at will outside the Federal Reserve.
Justice Sonia Sotomayor, dissenting, said the ruling could lead to “submission, instability, and even oppression,” and she argued that the president “emerges with more power than ever before.”
Trump voiced approval in a Truth Social post, saying, “It is such an Honor to be the sitting President who won this Historic and Unprecedented Ruling, one of the most important ever given with respect to Presidential Powers,” as the court’s decisions landed.
In the Cook case, Roberts said the court rejected the administration’s attempt to remove Cook now because it would allow the president to remove a Federal Reserve member “at any time, for any reason, without any notice before, and without any judicial check after.”
Roberts also included a footnote noting that nothing prevents Trump from “trying again” to fire Cook, provided she is given proper notice and a chance to contest it, while the Associated Press reported the administration is appealing a lower-court ruling in her favor.
What changes next
The Supreme Court’s decisions left the Federal Reserve’s independence intact “for now,” while weakening removal protections for other independent regulators, with the NBC News report saying the court allowed Trump to remove a member of the Federal Trade Commission, Rebecca Kelly Slaughter.
“The Supreme Court has dramatically expanded presidential power, upholding US President Donald Trump’s firings of the heads of independent federal agencies with one important exception: the Federal Reserve”
NBC News said the court overturned a key 1935 Supreme Court ruling called Humphrey’s Executor v. United States, and it described the Slaughter vote as 6-3 on ideological lines while the Cook vote was 5-4.
In the Cook case, the court’s procedural ruling sent the matter back to lower courts, where the administration would have to prove its allegations that Cook has committed mortgage fraud if it wishes to proceed with the firing, and where Cook would have a chance to challenge the accusation.
Cook welcomed the decision, saying Trump’s actions were “an attempt to remove me on a manufactured pretext because I refused to bow to political pressure and continued to set interest rates based only on what would best serve the American people,” while the BBC reported the decision affirmed the Federal Reserve’s independence.
The NBC News account said the court granted Trump free rein to continue firing members of agencies set up by Congress to be free of political interference, and it quoted Roberts in the Slaughter ruling: “Our Constitution creates three branches, but only one president.”
