The Fed Case and the Problem of the Dishonest President
Harry Litman
The consensus after Wednesday’s much-anticipated argument in Trump v. Cook was that the Supreme Court of the United States was likely to rebuff the president’s attempt to fire Federal Reserve governor Lisa Cook.
But while the bottom line was relatively clear, the rest of the story was murkier. The justices expressed frustration with the underdeveloped record in the case and with their obligation to figure out how to proceed on a record that was, in many ways, preliminary.
Thus, Justice Samuel Alito asked why the Court was being asked to proceed in such a hurry, noting concerns that key parts of the factual record were not clearly before the justices.
Of course, “hurried” here is five months since the attempted discharge, but that’s lickety-split in the world of appellate litigation. More to the point, the preliminary nature of the case and the record are completely a function of the Court’s own decision, as it has done so frequently in Trump’s first year, to grant review of the case in the early stages on an emergency-posture basis.
https://harrylitman.substack.com/p/the-fed-case-and-the-problem-of-the