Trump renews bid to fire Fed governor Lisa Cook despite supreme court ruling

Despite a recent United States Supreme Court ruling upholding the Federal Reserve's independence, President Donald Trump is once again attempting to remove its governor, Lisa Cook, over allegations of mortgage fraud. In a letter to Cook, the White House stated that Trump is "considering removing" her from her Fed position based on the same claims of mortgage fraud he made against her last summer. Cook received the notice, which demanded she respond in writing to the allegations within three weeks.

The Supreme Court ruled in June that Cook was entitled to remain in her position while she fights the president's allegations, stating that Trump "failed to afford Cook the procedural protections to which she was entitled by statute." The justices emphasized that without these protections, she could not adequately dispute the charges the president levied against her.

Cook's legal representative, Abbe D. Lowell, called the allegations "as baseless now as they were a year ago." He stressed that there is no valid cause for removing Cook, as per the facts and Supreme Court precedent. Cook, appointed by President Biden in 2022 for a 14-year term, is the first Black woman to serve as a Fed governor. Before joining the Fed, she served on Barack Obama's council of economic advisers and had taught at Harvard University and Stanford University.

Trump first fired Cook in August, accusing her of misidentifying her primary residence and mishandling rental income reporting. Cook denied the allegations and sued the administration for wrongful termination. The allegations appeared to coincide with Trump's criticism of the Fed for refusing to lower interest rates. Cook and then-Fed Chair Jerome Powell supported the central bank's decision not to cut rates, which provoked the White House.

Trump labeled Powell "too stupid and too political" and initiated a justice department investigation into renovations of the Fed's headquarters in Washington, which was later dropped.

Currently, the Fed is led by Kevin Warsh, a Trump appointee who has pledged to make decisions based on economic data rather than the president's wishes. Warsh aims to tackle the country's high inflation, typically addressed through interest rate hikes, while emphasizing that the Fed remains an independent institution.