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Instant Reaction: Supreme Court Blocks Trump from Firing Fed's Lisa Cook · Balance of Power

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Speaker 1: Bloomberg Audio Studios, Podcasts, radio News.
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Speaker 2: This is a breaking news update from Bloomberg instant reaction
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Speaker 2: and analysis from our three thousand journalists and analysts around
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Speaker 2: the world.
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Speaker 3: Paul, we have some breaking news.
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Speaker 4: The Supreme Court, of course publishing its opinions today. It
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Speaker 4: has expanded the president's power to firetop officials. It refuses
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Speaker 4: us to let the President immediately oust Lisa Cook, however,
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Speaker 4: and Lisa Cook is now currently allowed to stay in
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Speaker 4: the job for now.
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Speaker 5: All right, let's bring in June Grasso, Bloomberg's legal annalys here.
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Speaker 2: She joins us here in studio.
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Speaker 5: Let's start with Lisa Cook decision here, June, can you
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Speaker 5: summarize what's going on here?
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Speaker 6: So, Lisa Cook, as you know, Federal Reserve governor and
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Speaker 6: Donald Trump tried to fire her on the basis of
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Speaker 6: allegations of mortgage fraud. So there was no any kind
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Speaker 6: of procedure at all before he said that. So during
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Speaker 6: the oral arguments, it was pretty clear that the Supreme
1:07
Speaker 6: Court justices were going to vote with Lisa Cook and
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Speaker 6: not allow Trump to do that because of.
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Speaker 3: The status of the Federal Reserve.
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Speaker 6: And during the oral arguments there are a lot of
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Speaker 6: questions by the Conservatives as well about you know, why
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Speaker 6: was there no process here?
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Speaker 3: She had absolutely no process.
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Speaker 6: What would it take for you to have some kind
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Speaker 6: of hearing at least before this happened, So there was
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Speaker 6: concern on their part, and Justice Brett Kavanaugh had said
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Speaker 6: prior to that that the FED is different, so that
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Speaker 6: was expected. Now as far as the Slaughter case, where
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Speaker 6: she's on the FTC, they say that that's different, and
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Speaker 6: because it's not the FED. But what this does is
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Speaker 6: this really expands presidential power. It means that the president
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Speaker 6: has the authority to fire people at the top of.
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Speaker 3: What like twenty agencies or so.
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Speaker 6: And what they've done here is they've done away with
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Speaker 6: Humphrey's executor, which was a decision which is standing for
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Speaker 6: about seventy eighty years. I think about the ability of
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Speaker 6: presidents to fire people, which was that there was no
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Speaker 6: ability for them to fire people at the head of agencies.
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Speaker 6: And they've been cutting back on that bit by bit
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Speaker 6: by bit, and now they appear to have gotten rid
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Speaker 6: of it since they I haven't read the opinion yet obviously,
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Speaker 6: since they're allowing the Slaughter to be fired. And one
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Speaker 6: more thing too, if you notice this week what's happening
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Speaker 6: and last week what's been happening is that they're releasing
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Speaker 6: opinions at the same time that have to do with
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Speaker 6: the similar issue.
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Speaker 3: And what I think is happening.
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Speaker 6: Too, is it used to be that all the big
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Speaker 6: decisions were loaded to the very end the last day,
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Speaker 6: but now we're seeing big decisions this week and last week,
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Speaker 6: and I think the Chief is trying to mix it
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Speaker 6: up so we don't have a day on the last
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Speaker 6: day of the opinion and there were five sixty you know,
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Speaker 6: there were five six to three decisions and they were
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Speaker 6: all in these big cases. So I think that that's
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Speaker 6: what's happening here.
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Speaker 3: So let me just make sure I understand.
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Speaker 4: The Supreme Court ruled that Lisa Cook, a Federal Reserve governor,
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Speaker 4: can stay in her job for now. That's a that's
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Speaker 4: a good question, but it's while litigation continues, right right, right.
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Speaker 6: So yeah, because they've had no litigation at all. He
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Speaker 6: just said, you're you know, hello, she's getting due priors.
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Speaker 4: In other words, well, I assume that we have to
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Speaker 4: see what what the what the president does?
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Speaker 7: Now?
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Speaker 3: Are they going to go forward with this?
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Speaker 6: Are they going to bother to go forward with this
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Speaker 6: and have it litigated, probably, And she's got one of
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Speaker 6: the best Supreme Court litigators around, the former former Solicitor
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Speaker 6: General Paul Clement, who is just really his record at
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Speaker 6: the Supreme Court is phenomenal, and I think he is
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Speaker 6: the one who has argued the most cases at the Court.
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Speaker 6: And you can see the deference the Justice is paid.
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Speaker 3: To him when when he's arguing.
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Speaker 6: So, I mean that will go on, her litigation will
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Speaker 6: go on to you know, to stop this, but you know,
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Speaker 6: by the time, who knows, by the time it gets done,
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Speaker 6: Trump could be.
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Speaker 3: Out of office. I mean, the way these things drag on.
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Speaker 4: So the president's efforts to push her out of the
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Speaker 4: Central Banks.
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Speaker 3: Board, that is not that failed.
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Speaker 4: That failed, But and you were saying that his ability
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Speaker 4: to oust other government agency leaders.
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Speaker 3: Yeah, this has been expanded.
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Speaker 7: Right.
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Speaker 6: This is all part of the theory called the unitary
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Speaker 6: executive theory. I don't know if you've heard about it,
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Speaker 6: but it's like that this people who believe that the
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Speaker 6: power of the executive branch should be in the president.
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Speaker 6: So all these agencies are executive branch agency, so the
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Speaker 6: president should have the ability to fire the people who
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Speaker 6: are in charge of the executive branch agencies.
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Speaker 3: But I mean, you know, the FED is different, The
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Speaker 3: FED is different.
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Speaker 6: But I mean, so with with the normal president or
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Speaker 6: the prior presidents, you wouldn't worry about what was going
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Speaker 6: to happen because there wouldn't.
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Speaker 3: Be a wholesale you're fired.
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Speaker 6: But you know, this opens the door and people have
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Speaker 6: been worried about them doing away with that Humphrey's executive opinion.
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Speaker 2: And so the risk there.
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Speaker 5: Is that these agencies perhaps lose some of their independence.
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Speaker 6: Yes, yeah, yeah, because you know, if if the president
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Speaker 6: doesn't like what you're doing, you're fired, you know.
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Speaker 3: But I mean in reality, he is controlling.
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Speaker 6: He has put most people in those agency heads right
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Speaker 6: talking about the FCC and things like that. So I
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Speaker 6: don't know that they we'll see anything happening right away.
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Speaker 3: But it's a huge win.
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Speaker 6: And this court, as you know, has been expanding presidential
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Speaker 6: power over and over again. I mean, you had those
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Speaker 6: decisions where you know, nothing the president does in office
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Speaker 6: in his duties, can he be prosecuted for or so.
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Speaker 6: I mean, this court just believes in presidential power.
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Speaker 3: And one has to.
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Speaker 6: Wonder when the next president comes in if they're not Republican,
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Speaker 6: what whether they'll start cutting.
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Speaker 3: Back on presidential power.
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Speaker 4: I mean, I think it's worth noting here that stocks
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Speaker 4: fell to session low, are maybe not fall they paired
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Speaker 4: their gains, and we're at session lows right around the
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Speaker 4: time that this opinion was published. They've since come back
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Speaker 4: a little bit and we're looking at modest gains in
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Speaker 4: the SMP down Nasdaq. The Russell two thousand is lower
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Speaker 4: by one point one percent. So among the headlines that
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Speaker 4: we got is the Supreme Court letting Lisa Cook, a
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Speaker 4: Federal Reserve governor, stay in her job. This is a
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Speaker 4: case that really tested the central banks independence from the
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Speaker 4: White House. So this is a defeat for the president's
6:27
Speaker 4: efforts to ouster over these mortgage fraud allegations. At the
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Speaker 4: same time, we also heard that the Supreme Court has
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Speaker 4: basically said that the mail in ballots can arrive.
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Speaker 3: After election date.
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Speaker 4: That's another defeat for the president, and certainly this is
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Speaker 4: relevant given that we're at a midyear, midterm election year.
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Speaker 4: On the other hand, and June, this is where it
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Speaker 4: gets a little complicated. The other government agencies are not
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Speaker 4: seen as independent really because the president can and let
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Speaker 4: go of whoever he wants to.
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Speaker 6: Yeah, and I you know, I'm trying to pull up
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Speaker 6: the opinion just to see what they're you know, how
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Speaker 6: they how they parsed out these two these two cases.
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Speaker 6: But I'm not getting it. I'm not getting it. I
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Speaker 6: guess that's fresh refresh.
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Speaker 2: How about this mailet?
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Speaker 5: This ballot case just gives your thoughts on.
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Speaker 6: That that was That was a surprise, actually the ballot case,
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Speaker 6: because that's about Mississippi has a law, as do more
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Speaker 6: than twenty other states, that as long as the ballot
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Speaker 6: is postmarked by election day, it can come in five
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Speaker 6: days up to five days after and it'll still be counted.
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Speaker 6: So the Republicans were against this. Obviously, President Trump is
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Speaker 6: against this and any kind of mail in ballots, and
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Speaker 6: during the oral arguments, a lot of the Conservatives seemed
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Speaker 6: to be in favorite, although the Chief Justice and Justice
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Speaker 6: Barrett were wondering, well would this effect what about states that.
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Speaker 3: Have all mail in ballots? If we say that?
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Speaker 6: So, the argument is in the Constitution says election day
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Speaker 6: is this day, so you shouldn't be extending it any further. Well,
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Speaker 6: if you can't extend it further, then can you go
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Speaker 6: you know, can you also say, well, they can come
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Speaker 6: in ahead of time. So I think that was part
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Speaker 6: of the reasoning. And Justice Barrett wrote the opinion. But
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Speaker 6: so that's a huge surprise. And it was five to four,
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Speaker 6: and so the most conservative in the in the no column.
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Speaker 3: And so that's big because that could have affected the.
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Speaker 6: Elections the midterms coming up in so many states, more
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Speaker 6: than twenty. So that's actually a big decision and it
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Speaker 6: is a surprise.
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Speaker 5: Okay, very good, Drian, thank you so much, appreciate it.
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Speaker 5: June Grosso was a legal analyst for Bloomberg News. We'll
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Speaker 5: let her go back and do that lawyer thing like
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Speaker 5: actually read the cave this.
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Speaker 4: We would put her in an unfair position because she
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Speaker 4: was working without the texts.
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Speaker 2: I just want the AI like cliff notes.
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Speaker 3: Oh, thanks a lot.
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Speaker 2: I'll be leaving on one pager. Dard, thanks so much.
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Speaker 2: We appreciate that. As always.
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Speaker 5: It's good lah Stein litigation analyst for Bloomberg Intelligence. All
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Speaker 5: I want to go to the Lisa Cook caste for me.
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Speaker 1: For now.
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Speaker 5: What is for now means that she can stay in
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Speaker 5: her job for now?
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Speaker 1: Yeah, exactly.
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Speaker 8: Well, this whole appeal was based on a preliminary ruling
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Speaker 8: by the trial court earlier in the case saying that
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Speaker 8: she could stay in her position while the rest of
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Speaker 8: the case would continue. And so that's really the issue
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Speaker 8: that the Supreme Court was looking at, and they said, yes,
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Speaker 8: she can stay in her position. But the real important
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Speaker 8: part of the ruling is that they said the four
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Speaker 8: cause removal restriction requires that she have some sort of
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Speaker 8: notice and opportunity to be heard, which the President and
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Speaker 8: the administration did not offer her.
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Speaker 1: So that's sort of the crux of the ruling.
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Speaker 4: Okay, so her litigation can continue, or the White Houses litigation.
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Speaker 3: Can continue as well. Who hears this case?
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Speaker 1: So this will go back to the lower courts.
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Speaker 8: And I said preface this by saying, I haven't read
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Speaker 8: before vicasion. I've read the brief summary you reference, you
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Speaker 8: know you want, but the Supreme Court sort of gives
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Speaker 8: you a brief summary at the beginning of the opinion,
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Speaker 8: which I skimmed. But I think the way it's going
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Speaker 8: to proceed is that it will be sent back down
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Speaker 8: to the trial court for them to issue a final ruling.
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Speaker 8: But the administration, presumably if they want, will have to
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Speaker 8: offer her some sort of notice an opportunity to be heard.
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Speaker 8: If they want to be able to continue to try
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Speaker 8: to fire her.
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Speaker 1: Otherwise the trial court is going to ruin her favor.
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Speaker 5: So to the extend the administration one to extend litigation,
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Speaker 5: would it shud been known to do in the past.
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Speaker 5: What's a timeline for a case like this, because I'm
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Speaker 5: wondering if does she have to worry about you know,
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Speaker 5: is this something that could take dragon for years, in
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Speaker 5: which case the ministry Trump administration will you know end
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Speaker 5: or how does that be?
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Speaker 8: Yeah, I mean it's a little unclear exactly how it's
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Speaker 8: going to proceed. Presumably, if the Trump administration continues to
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Speaker 8: want to remove her from the FED based on these
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Speaker 8: accusations of mortgage fraud, they'll have to have some sort
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Speaker 8: of proceeding, not a full trial, but some sort of
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Speaker 8: like administrative proceeding where she can present her defenses. If
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Speaker 8: the administration doesn't want to do that, the case is
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Speaker 8: essentially over. The trial court will rule in her favor
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Speaker 8: and say there was no notice an opportunity to be
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Speaker 8: heard pursue into what the Supreme Court said this morning.
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Speaker 4: Okay, so is the Supreme Court role in Lisa Cook
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Speaker 4: done for now?
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Speaker 1: For now?
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Speaker 8: It could always come back later, because I don't know
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Speaker 8: if we have real resolution on substantively what cause requires. Right,
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Speaker 8: we sort of know now procedurally what it requires. I'm
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Speaker 8: not sure that the Supreme Court, I haven't read the
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Speaker 8: full opinion. Again, I'm not sure they got into the
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Speaker 8: actual definition.
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Speaker 1: Of what foroe cause requires substantively.
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Speaker 4: Okay, what does this say about how the Supreme Court
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Speaker 4: views the federers are versus other government agencies.
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Speaker 8: Yeah, this is a very good point because the other opinion,
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Speaker 8: one of the other opinions that they issued but simultaneously
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Speaker 8: with the Cook decision, was the Rebecca Slaughter opinion. She
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Speaker 8: was an FTC commissioner, as you would call. President Trump
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Speaker 8: fired multiple commissioners from independent agencies who were appointed by Democrats.
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Speaker 1: For the most part, she challenged that, as.
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Speaker 8: Did many other commissioners, and the Supreme Court early on
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Speaker 8: sort of hinted that the president would be able to
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Speaker 8: fire these other commissioners of independent agencies. But the Federal
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Speaker 8: Reserve is different, and we saw that very clearly today
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Speaker 8: because the Supreme Court said that the President could indeed
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Speaker 8: fire Rebecca Slaughter and other independent commissioners. I haven't read
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Speaker 8: that opinion either, but presumably they overruled the Humphrey's Executor
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Speaker 8: decision from ninety years ago, which established that the four
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Speaker 8: cause removal restriction was constitutional for independent agents. He's I
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Speaker 8: suspect now they're going to say it's unconstitutional.
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Speaker 5: I feel like this today was a win. I think
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Speaker 5: that that Slaughter case is huge.
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Speaker 8: The slaughtercase is a big deal. It's absolutely yeah. But
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Speaker 8: that's not just a win for Trump. That's a win
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Speaker 8: for the executive branch, because your next president who comes
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Speaker 8: in can fire any commissioner of an independent agency appointed
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Speaker 8: by a Republican the better.
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Speaker 2: Way to president. It's a win for the executive Yeah.
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Speaker 8: And he's going to be very upset about the Lisa
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Speaker 8: Cook decision. And also he in an earlier order it
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Speaker 8: sounded like he lost his cert petition on the mail
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Speaker 8: in ballot and on the mail in ballots and the
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Speaker 8: Jane Carol right exactly going on, so that he's probably
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Speaker 8: going to be hited this afternoon.
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Speaker 2: A branch though I'm not sure that.
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Speaker 1: I mean so.
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Speaker 5: Now, the question for a lot of just scholars, constitutional scholars,
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Speaker 5: is isn't it aren't these agencies their ability to be independent?
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Speaker 2: Isn't that a good thing? And I guess that's the
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Speaker 2: debate run.
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Speaker 8: So you have to balance that on the one hand
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Speaker 8: versus this theory called the unitary executive theory, that the
14:04
Speaker 8: president should be able to hire and fire anyone he
14:09
Speaker 8: wants and the executive brands, and that he oversees the
14:12
Speaker 8: entire executive brands. And if you have these independent commissioneries
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Speaker 8: that the president can fire, you almost have this fourth
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Speaker 8: branch of government.
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Speaker 1: That's the counter argument. Interesting.
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Speaker 4: Okay, we have some comments from Senator Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts.
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Speaker 4: She is commenting on the Lisa Cook Supreme Court decision,
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Speaker 4: says we'll keep fighting back against attacks on the Fed.
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Speaker 4: She also talks about Bill Poulti and how he can't
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Speaker 4: be trusted should be removed, but that's separate from again
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Speaker 4: her comments on Lisa Cook and how, according to Senator Warren,
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Speaker 4: she or her party will keep fighting back against these
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Speaker 4: attacks on the Federal Reserve. What are the White House's
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Speaker 4: options now? How does it move forward with Lisa Cook specifically?
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Speaker 8: Well, I think if they want to continue to go
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Speaker 8: after her for these accusations of mortgage fraud, they can,
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Speaker 8: but they'll have to have some sort of proceeding where
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Speaker 8: she's allowed to present her defenses. I think that's basically it.
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Speaker 8: It's unclear exactly what that looks like. The Supreme Court,
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Speaker 8: in the summary that I was able to read before
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Speaker 8: coming on, said it doesn't have to be a full
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Speaker 8: blown trial, but they have to give her some opportunity
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Speaker 8: to be heard and present her defenses.
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Speaker 4: And just to put some context on Senator Warren's comments
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Speaker 4: about Bill POULTI Bill Poulty was the one who brought
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Speaker 4: up the fact that Lisa Cook perhaps had these misrepresented
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Speaker 4: her mortgage application, right because he was the head of
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Speaker 4: the FHFA, and he brought it to the President's attention,
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Speaker 4: and that kind of got everything started, Paul with this
15:38
Speaker 4: allegation of mortgage fraud.
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Speaker 5: So if I'm an agency head appointed by anybody other
15:44
Speaker 5: than Donald Trump, am I nervous about my job today?
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Speaker 1: Probably? But I think he's already fired most of the
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Speaker 1: ones he wants to fire.
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Speaker 8: I mean, I'm serious. Look at the CFTC. You have
15:54
Speaker 8: one chairman and that's it. No other commissioneris and so
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Speaker 8: you know the effect of that is you don't have
16:01
Speaker 8: You're probably not going to change the votes because you're
16:03
Speaker 8: always going to It was always tradition that the chair
16:05
Speaker 8: would resign and let the incoming president appoint someone from
16:08
Speaker 8: his own party. But you're not going to have the
16:10
Speaker 8: scenting voices now to push back on the majority in
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Speaker 8: these agencies. And I think that's really the big effect.
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Speaker 4: Is how much of this is a surprise. What surprises
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Speaker 4: you about this string of decisions?
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Speaker 1: Nothing.
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Speaker 8: This was exactly as we anticipated that Humphrey's executor would
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Speaker 8: be overruled. The president would be able to fire commissioners
16:30
Speaker 8: of independent agencies under the unitary executive theory. But the
16:33
Speaker 8: Supreme Court gave us hints as far back as last
16:36
Speaker 8: year that the Federal Reserve is different just based on
16:41
Speaker 8: it said that it has a unique structure or a
16:43
Speaker 8: unique history.
16:44
Speaker 1: It's not really.
16:46
Speaker 8: It's sort of this quasi private entity because it has
16:50
Speaker 8: a mix of being a government entity and also private
16:53
Speaker 8: sector members who or at least private sector members who
16:57
Speaker 8: vote in some of the regional bank. So it didn't
17:03
Speaker 8: come as a surprise. We thought the fair would be
17:04
Speaker 8: treated differently.
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Speaker 3: Millon Bellot, was that a surprise.
17:08
Speaker 1: That's a little bit of a surprise. I don't follow
17:09
Speaker 1: that case.
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Speaker 8: It doesn't have a huge doesn't have a business impact fair,
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Speaker 8: But yes, I would say it's a little bit of
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Speaker 8: a surprise, and I think June priorly touched on that earlier.
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Speaker 5: All Right, good elliot Stein, great stuff as always Eliot Stein,
17:21
Speaker 5: Bloomberg intelligence litigation analyst.
17:23
Speaker 2: See that law school paid.
17:25
Speaker 5: Off totally and he started strong Stanford and then he
17:29
Speaker 5: took a long term film the law school.
17:31
Speaker 4: I mean he did that all without the benefit of
17:33
Speaker 4: reading the full time. So thank you Elliott for doing
17:36
Speaker 4: that exactly.
17:37
Speaker 5: Thomack Kendall joins us here. She is outside of the
17:40
Speaker 5: Supreme Court. She's a Bloomberg News Washington correspondent, Tyler. What's
17:43
Speaker 5: the feeling do you think within what do you think
17:45
Speaker 5: the takeaway will be from this president from this administration
17:48
Speaker 5: about this busy, busy day of Supreme Court rulings.
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Speaker 3: Well, by and.
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Speaker 7: Large, Paul, the administration got a win when it comes
17:57
Speaker 7: to the Trumpet Slaughter case, essentially expanding the president's authority
18:01
Speaker 7: to remove independent heads of independent agencies. Rebecca Slaughter was
18:06
Speaker 7: the last Democratic commissioner on the Federal Trade Commission, so
18:09
Speaker 7: that is considered to be a win for the Trump administration.
18:13
Speaker 7: Not necessarily a surprising decision. The justices had been a
18:18
Speaker 7: little bit wary of the idea that the president wouldn't
18:22
Speaker 7: be able to remove officials that are accountable to the
18:27
Speaker 7: executive branch. But the Lisa Cook decision means that she
18:31
Speaker 7: can stay in her job, at least for now, which
18:34
Speaker 7: means that that legal fight does continue. The justices did
18:38
Speaker 7: not weigh in on whether or not they believed that
18:41
Speaker 7: the Trump administration's accusations rise to the level that Lisa
18:44
Speaker 7: Cook should be fired, which means this is still a
18:47
Speaker 7: stay tuned situation. But by and large, that part of
18:51
Speaker 7: the decisions today does mark at least partially a setback for.
18:55
Speaker 3: This White House.
18:57
Speaker 4: So when it comes to Lisa Cook, I guess a
19:00
Speaker 4: lot of people are wondering what that means for j. Powell,
19:03
Speaker 4: because the former FED chair had said that he would
19:06
Speaker 4: stay on the Federal Reserve Board until legal issues are resolved,
19:11
Speaker 4: and maybe Lisa Cook.
19:12
Speaker 1: Was one of them.
19:13
Speaker 4: But I guess the FED renovation and the DOJ's action
19:17
Speaker 4: against the FED and JAPAU specifically, it's still out there,
19:21
Speaker 4: isn't it.
19:23
Speaker 7: Yeah, And it could come back up. There were a
19:25
Speaker 7: few different threads that we were watching in this case, Scarlett.
19:28
Speaker 7: One is the idea of equities. Basically that the justices
19:32
Speaker 7: were looking into what the broad range impacts would be
19:35
Speaker 7: when it comes to the Federal Reserve and what would
19:37
Speaker 7: happen to the US economy if a governor was removed.
19:41
Speaker 7: And I bring that up because we heard this be
19:44
Speaker 7: one of the main arguments from one of the conservative justices,
19:48
Speaker 7: Brett Kavanaugh. His line of questioning back when this case
19:50
Speaker 7: was heard in January very much focused on this. I'm
19:54
Speaker 7: trying to find the quote at the time he said
19:56
Speaker 7: that if Lisa Cook was removed, it would quote weaken,
19:59
Speaker 7: if not shatter, the independence of the FED. And today
20:02
Speaker 7: the decision was five to four, and that included Brett
20:04
Speaker 7: Kavanaugh siding with the liberal justices on this court in
20:09
Speaker 7: favor of Lisa Cook being able to keep her job
20:12
Speaker 7: for now.
20:12
Speaker 3: So that's probably a thread that would make.
20:14
Speaker 7: Its way through if a case against Powell ultimately came up.
20:19
Speaker 7: And the second is the idea that Lisa Cook wasn't
20:22
Speaker 7: given essentially due process in responding to the allegations against
20:26
Speaker 7: her before she was fired. You remember when all of
20:29
Speaker 7: this was happening, and essentially she was fired via a
20:31
Speaker 7: tweet from President Trump without much chance to respond to
20:36
Speaker 7: the allegations that were posted on social media. So there
20:40
Speaker 7: are a lot of different factors in this case, but
20:42
Speaker 7: by and large, it is taken to mean that the
20:44
Speaker 7: Supreme Court bolstered the independence of the Central Bank.
20:48
Speaker 1: Tyler.
20:48
Speaker 5: We also had a ruling Supreme Court earlier today left
20:51
Speaker 5: intact a jury's finding that Donald Trump sexually abused and
20:55
Speaker 5: defamed the writer e Gen Carol, putting her in line
20:58
Speaker 5: to collect a five lane.
21:00
Speaker 2: Dollar award from the president. What is the president tom
21:03
Speaker 2: in on this particular case, So we.
21:07
Speaker 7: Haven't heard from him yet today, and the justices didn't
21:10
Speaker 7: really provide much of an explanation for this decision. But
21:16
Speaker 7: this probably isn't going to be something that President Trump
21:19
Speaker 7: is too happy with. This does deal essentially a final
21:21
Speaker 7: blow to President Trump's efforts to thought and one of
21:26
Speaker 7: the most significant legal cases against him. It was another
21:29
Speaker 7: one that we were tracking closely, but it wasn't heard
21:32
Speaker 7: in the standard term of this Supreme Court, so we
21:35
Speaker 7: came out earlier this morning instead of with this ruling. Instead,
21:38
Speaker 7: we just got this Supreme Court decision, which means that
21:44
Speaker 7: President Trump is going to have to pay that five
21:46
Speaker 7: million dollar.
21:46
Speaker 4: Judgment all in all, Tyler, what do you expect in
21:49
Speaker 4: terms of the presidents of giving some kind of response.
21:53
Speaker 4: How does he usually respond to these kinds of decisions.
21:57
Speaker 4: Will it be on truth social? Do you think do
21:59
Speaker 4: we expect to him to hold a news conference, for instance?
22:02
Speaker 3: What will you be looking for.
22:04
Speaker 7: I would expect that we'll probably we'll probably get a
22:07
Speaker 7: posed out on truth social today. President Trump actually doesn't
22:09
Speaker 7: have any public events on his schedule. That doesn't mean
22:12
Speaker 7: that some of the closed door events couldn't open up.
22:14
Speaker 7: He does have a few different policy meetings that we're
22:16
Speaker 7: tracking closely today, but this case was one where President
22:20
Speaker 7: Trump was heavily involved in. We're also waiting, likely later
22:23
Speaker 7: this week to get a decision on the other really
22:26
Speaker 7: console consequential case that we're watching for, which is birthright citizenship.
22:30
Speaker 7: And I was actually here at the court back in
22:31
Speaker 7: April when President Trump came here too. He very clearly
22:36
Speaker 7: wanted to make his opinion known when it comes to
22:39
Speaker 7: the justices trying to figure out the legality of his
22:44
Speaker 7: executive order that deals with ending automatic birthright citizenship. I
22:48
Speaker 7: would expect him to be very vocal when we get
22:50
Speaker 7: that decision, likely later this week. We could maybe see
22:54
Speaker 7: it early next week if the Supreme Court adds a
22:56
Speaker 7: date in early July, but we're really expecting that to
22:59
Speaker 7: be later the speak. So it could potentially be two
23:01
Speaker 7: blows to the Trump administration's agenda when it comes to
23:04
Speaker 7: the Lisa Cook case and what appears to be a
23:06
Speaker 7: weariness around the Trump administration's argument related to birthright citizenship.
23:09
Speaker 4: Oh, thank you for spinning a forward for us, Tyler.
23:11
Speaker 4: Tyler Kendall's our chief Washington correspondent, of course, giving us
23:15
Speaker 4: the latest with regards to the Supreme Court letting Lisa Cook,
23:19
Speaker 4: a Federal Reserve governor, stay in her job for now.
23:21
Speaker 4: We're going to get into what all this means and
23:24
Speaker 4: what this means in terms of what the Fed looks
23:26
Speaker 4: like now that the Supreme Court has made this ruling.
23:30
Speaker 4: Gotham Makonda is lecturer at the Yale School of Management
23:33
Speaker 4: and a Bloomberg Opinion contributor. He writes regularly on issues
23:37
Speaker 4: of management, the intersection of policy and business. Got them
23:41
Speaker 4: your initial thoughts on this headline The ruling from the
23:46
Speaker 4: Supreme Court that it has allowed Lisa Cook to stay
23:49
Speaker 4: in her job for now, and it has pretty much
23:51
Speaker 4: signaled that the Federal Reserve is different than other government agencies.
23:56
Speaker 9: Yeah, it's not a surprising ruling, because the Court has
23:58
Speaker 9: already signaled that it so that Federal Reserve is different.
24:01
Speaker 9: I think the striking thing about it is the extent
24:04
Speaker 9: to which the Court has basically just abandoned jurisprudence and
24:08
Speaker 9: as saying, we like the Federal Reserve, we think it's
24:10
Speaker 9: really important, so we're going to treat it as a
24:12
Speaker 9: special case, whereas every other government agency. And they also
24:16
Speaker 9: announced it right that this was another one of the
24:18
Speaker 9: rulings today that the president does have the power to
24:21
Speaker 9: fire FTC commissioners. Every other government agency gets treated like
24:25
Speaker 9: upon the president. But somehow, for mystical reasons, we will
24:30
Speaker 9: not really specify the Federal Reserve is special.
24:32
Speaker 10: Okay, I guess it is.
24:34
Speaker 5: We were informed by you know, a couple of our
24:37
Speaker 5: guests legal backgrounds, that there's some theory out there that says, hey,
24:40
Speaker 5: you know, the universal kind of thing. I'm not sure
24:43
Speaker 5: what it's called, but basically says, the president should be
24:45
Speaker 5: able to do all this stuff. It's his or her administration,
24:48
Speaker 5: and so the president should be able to appoint who
24:52
Speaker 5: they want in these agencies.
24:53
Speaker 9: And so the theory is the unitary executive that's what
24:56
Speaker 9: they're referring to. It's the idea that every single person
25:00
Speaker 9: in the executive branch is kind of like the fingers
25:02
Speaker 9: of the hand of the president. The unitary executive theory
25:05
Speaker 9: is something that was invented quite recently, really in the
25:08
Speaker 9: nineteen seventies. If you'd taken it to one of the founders,
25:09
Speaker 9: they would have just been baffled. But just to demonstrate
25:12
Speaker 9: how it breaks down so completely, inspector general Inspectors general,
25:16
Speaker 9: the people whose job it is to identify fraud and
25:19
Speaker 9: you know, tell us that, you know, the president or
25:22
Speaker 9: his or his appointees is stealing from the American public,
25:25
Speaker 9: are also members of the executive branch. So if the
25:27
Speaker 9: unitary executive theory was true, then it would be a
25:31
Speaker 9: power of the president to order inspector generals to cover
25:34
Speaker 9: up for his own crimes.
25:36
Speaker 10: If that makes sense to you, then you believe in
25:38
Speaker 10: the unitary executive.
25:41
Speaker 4: Wow, Okay, I had to think about that one for
25:43
Speaker 4: a little bit. But that is saying something. So this
25:46
Speaker 4: idea that the Federal Reserve is different. Can the Trump
25:50
Speaker 4: administration do anything else in its you know, quest to
25:54
Speaker 4: remake the FED or is this something where they kind
25:57
Speaker 4: of just have to call it an l and step
26:00
Speaker 4: How are you thinking this through?
26:02
Speaker 9: Well, the ruling is a fo now ruling, right, So
26:05
Speaker 9: what they're presumably going to do is then continue on
26:07
Speaker 9: with the litigation against Lisa Cook in the hope of
26:10
Speaker 9: either winning a conviction or just you know, draining her
26:12
Speaker 9: resources and her resolve to such an extent that she
26:15
Speaker 9: steps down. I don't think either of those will work,
26:18
Speaker 9: because the charges against her are on their face quite absurd,
26:21
Speaker 9: and she doesn't seem like the sort of person who's
26:23
Speaker 9: going to back down in the face of this kind
26:25
Speaker 9: of an assault.
26:26
Speaker 10: But this story is not over. We're just we just
26:29
Speaker 10: ended one chapter.
26:30
Speaker 2: President Trumps out with a tweet just now.
26:33
Speaker 5: Of course, I'm sure you're not surprised, but basically touting
26:36
Speaker 5: the Slaughter case as a all caps big win here
26:41
Speaker 5: and really saying this is, you know, presidents have been
26:43
Speaker 5: trying to do this since the nineteen thirties. Again, try
26:48
Speaker 5: and put this into context. It seems like a win
26:50
Speaker 5: for not just Donald Trump, but for the executive branch.
26:55
Speaker 5: But again, and maybe it's a it's a real loss
26:57
Speaker 5: for independence.
26:58
Speaker 2: It's tough. I'm not sure how you weigh those two things.
27:01
Speaker 1: That's right.
27:02
Speaker 9: So it is clearly the Supreme Court and Chief Justice
27:05
Speaker 9: Roberts in particular, and you know, has a long history
27:08
Speaker 9: of just saying that he wants to concentrate power in
27:11
Speaker 9: the hands of the executive branch and in the hands
27:14
Speaker 9: of the Court. And we should note, right, it's not
27:16
Speaker 9: just the executive branch, it's the Court, because the Court
27:19
Speaker 9: has arrogated it two itself, the ability to say that
27:23
Speaker 9: we you know, we can at any time make up
27:25
Speaker 9: rules that say that, hey, the executive branch doesn't.
27:28
Speaker 10: Have this power.
27:29
Speaker 9: But okay, so they've done that, and they've contracted these
27:31
Speaker 9: powers into the Court, into the Court and of the
27:34
Speaker 9: executive branch.
27:35
Speaker 10: That is a big win. But there's some There are
27:37
Speaker 10: two sets of questions here.
27:38
Speaker 9: One is, are these powers that this Court is going
27:42
Speaker 9: to allocate to all presidents or is it just going
27:44
Speaker 9: to be presidents that it seems to like. And I
27:46
Speaker 9: don't think we know the answer to that yet. And
27:48
Speaker 9: second is, you know, a different president who had a
27:51
Speaker 9: much more ambitious view of what they wanted to do
27:54
Speaker 9: in policy. And I can tell you the Democrats are
27:56
Speaker 9: already talking about how they can use the powers that
27:59
Speaker 9: the Court has given the executive when they take office,
28:02
Speaker 9: is going to use this in a very very different
28:03
Speaker 9: ways ways that I suspect Chief Office Roberts is not
28:06
Speaker 9: going to lif