The Trump administration asked the Supreme Court on Thursday to immediately allow the president to fire Federal Reserve Gov. Lisa Cook while the case against her continues in an appeals court.
Her removal should precede any decision the justices issue, Solicitor General John Sauer wrote Thursday.
“That the Federal Reserve Board plays a uniquely important role in the American economy only heightens the government’s and the public’s interest in ensuring that an ethically compromised member does not continue wielding its vast powers,” Sauer wrote.
Arguments will be held Nov. 5. A decision is likely to come before the end of the Supreme Court’s term next summer.
Sauer argued that lower-court orders blocking Cook’s firing by President Donald Trump mark “yet another case of improper judicial interference.” That, and later orders have “invite[d] judicial micromanagement,” Sauer added.
A district court judge “lacked authority to order reinstatement as an equitable remedy for the removal of an officer of the United States, as we have discussed in several recent stay applications,” Sauer argued.
Sauer also argued Trump had “sufficient cause” to fire Cook, amid mortgage fraud allegations, raised by Federal Housing Finance Agency Director Bill Pulte — for which the Fed governor hasn’t been charged.
“The President’s strong concerns about the appearance of mortgage fraud, based on facially contradictory representations made to obtain mortgages by someone whose job is to set interest rates that affect Americans’ mortgages, satisfies any conception of cause,” Sauer wrote. “So long as the President identifies a cause, the determination of ‘some cause relating to the conduct, ability, fitness, or competence of the officer’ is within the President’s unreviewable discretion.”
Thursday’s action follows a 2-1 ruling Monday by the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals, upholding a district court order allowing Cook to stay at the Fed.
The Justice Department had tried to seal Cook’s removal ahead of her vote Wednesday, along with other members of the Federal Open Market Committee, to set interest rates.
The committee cut the interest rate by 0.25 percentage points — the first reduction this year and a step toward Trump’s long-vocal demand for lower rates.
However, Sauer argued, “the President may reasonably determine that interest rates paid by the American people should not be set by a Governor who appears to have lied about facts material to the interest rates she secured for herself — and refuses to explain the apparent misrepresentations.”
Sauer also took issue with another facet of Cook’s firing: due process. Cook’s lawyers have argued the allegations against her were raised in a social media post — and that Trump fired her in a social media post, too —constituting insufficient notice.
“Due process is a flexible concept,” Sauer wrote. “Whatever process is due to principal officers was provided here.”
Trump "notified Cook of the charges against her and waited five days for her to respond before removing her," Sauer wrote.
"Having declined to bring any defense to the President's attention or to dispute any material facts, Cook cannot complain about insufficient process," he added.
Further, Sauer argued, Cook’s service as a Fed governor isn’t a “property interest” that gives her grounds to sue.
A spokesperson for Cook’s lawyers did not immediately return a request for comment Thursday.
In his filing, Sauer noted that the Supreme Court has twice granted Trump’s requests to immediately remove members of other federal boards while emergency applications were pending.
Despite dissents by three justices, the court allowed Trump to provisionally remove Biden appointees to the National Labor Relations Board and the Federal Trade Commission while litigation continues.
