The Standoff the Supreme Court Left the Door Open for Is Here
This is your TPM evening briefing.
President Trump purported to fire Federal Reserve Governor Lisa Cook on Sunday, an unprecedented, unsurprising move in his quest to stock the once-independent bank with cronies who will lower interest rates.
Cook, at likely great personal expense — both financial and reputational — is fighting back, with her attorney Abbe Lowel vowing to file a lawsuit to challenge her removal. Bill Pulte, MAGA keyboard warrior-turned-director of the Federal Housing Finance Agency, has apparently been using his position to scan the mortgage documents of Trump’s enemies for any whiff of impropriety or error, then turning them over to the Justice Department for a full-on criminal probe. Cook is just the latest villain in the MAGA cinematic universe to get such treatment, following Sen. Adam Schiff (D-CA) and New York AG Leticia James.
The case challenging the first-ever presidential firing of a Fed governor will almost certainly make it to the Supreme Court — where the extremity of conservatives’ mission to drive the independent agency into extinction will be tested.
The Court’s right-wing majority has been largely gleeful to cosign Trump’s rampage through the federal government, the weakening of executive branch agencies being a special hobbyhorse for Chief Justice John Roberts in particular. As they blessed his firings of board members once thought to be protected from at-will firing, they inserted a caveat.
“Finally, respondents Gwynne Wilcox and Cathy Harris contend that arguments in this case necessarily implicate the constitutionality of for-cause removal protections for members of the Federal Reserve’s Board of Governors or other members of the Federal Open Market Committee,” said the unsigned majority opinion (the three liberals dissented). “We disagree. The Federal Reserve is a uniquely structured, quasi-private entity that follows in the distinct historical tradition of the First and Second Banks of the United States.”
But all that really seems to tell us is that the Court isn’t okay with Trump firing Fed governors at will. That’s not what this is. He’s claiming that he’s firing Cook for cause: the ginned up claims of mortgage fraud. That will leave the Supreme Court to decide, for the first time in its history, whether that “cause” is sufficient.
The conservatives may run into some other minor obstacles: Georgetown Law professor Marty Lederman pointed to a 1903 ruling that suggested notice and hearing may be a requirement for a president’s for-cause removal. But the case law is predictably thin in a previously untested realm of presidential power.
And it’s untested for a reason. While presidents have tried to manipulate the Fed to their own ends before, the necessity for its independence has always been obvious. Anyone with a stake in a stable economy wants an independent central bank that can make reasoned, predictable decisions about when to raise and lower interest rates rather than a partisan appendage that may blow up the economy while attempting to secure good conditions to bolster a president’s political standing.
For this president, though, the choice between a stable economy and possible near-term political gain is not a close one.
— Kate Riga
GOP Rep Sorta Breaks With Trump on Future Plans for Military Occupation of Blue Cities
Republicans lawmakers are still back home in their districts for the lengthy August recess and it looks like at least one was brave enough to hold an in-person town hall event amid the backlash to Trump’s summer of militarized harassment of people who live in blue cities.
Rep. Mark Alford (R-MO) — who represents Missouri’s 4th congressional district, which overwhelmingly supported Trump in 2024 — held a town hall this week, during which he fielded questions from audience members who were shouting and arguing with each other about Trump’s deployment of the National Guard to D.C. and Los Angeles. Alford reportedly told constituents that he’s good with Trump’s decision to send troops to LA and Washington if they’re being sent in as a response to protests against Trump’s immigration enforcement.
“But I do not think that we should be sending National Guard into other cities unless the governor, unless the governor [asks],” he said, per NBC News.
That would appear to put him at odds with the president’s supposed plans to deploy troops into other blue cities like Baltimore and Chicago — both blue cities with Black mayors (same goes for LA and D.C.) that he’s said are next on his list.
— Nicole Lafond
DeSantis Thinks He Can Tell Someone to Stop Trolling
The man who used his second term as governor to mostly soft-launch his bid to become the next leader of the MAGA movement and who opens detention centers designed to humiliate immigrants for sport has some advice for California Gov. Gavin Newsom: stop being “cheeky” about Trump and focus on being governor.
“Wait a minute, you’ve got problems in your state — of homelessness, people can’t rebuild, crushing taxes and regulations — why don’t you focus on fixing those rather than trying to be cheeky with the president of the United States?” DeSantis told Fox News’ Sean Hannity this week, as the two discussed Newsom’s effort to counter Trump’s nationwide partisan gerrymandering spree.
— Nicole Lafond
In Case You Missed It
Don’t miss out on Kate Riga and Josh Kovensky’s scoop yesterday: The University of Michigan Will End Gender Affirming Care for Minors Amid Trump Admin Legal Onslaught
Trump Outlines Vision for Next Power Grab Over Blue State and City Officials
It’s Not Enough But It’s Something: DC Tenuously Holds The Line Against Trump
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