There are always things in life that I don’t understand. I bet you a lot of people feel that way. How did that happen? Why did that happen? Or it makes no sense. Somehow we have to accept these decisions, even if we don’t like them or understand them. So here’s a couple.
The Supreme Court ruled that President Biden’s appointee to the Federal Trade Commission could be fired by President Trump. Justice Neil Gorsuch, concurring in the court’s decision, said “independent agencies are not so independent after all.”
Well that I like. Makes perfect sense. As Mr. Trump put it, it reverses a bad decision made by the Supremes 91 years ago back in 1935. It gives the chief executive true executive authority. He defines quote “cause.” Yet what I don’t understand is how the Supremes let Governor Lisa Cook off the hook regarding the Federal Reserve. They decided that at least one so-called independent agency was truly independent and cited a way-long-ago, more or less 200 years ago precedent for the First and Second Bank of the United States. A long time ago.
By the way President Jackson didn’t think the Second Bank of the United States was so independent because he stopped their charter from being extended. Anyway, today’s court also cited the Federal Reserve Act of 1913. That’s a long time ago. Yet many people believe that central bank charter was highly ambiguous. And if presidents have the authority to appoint chairs and governors, they should have the same authority to fire them.
And then Justice Brett Kavanaugh, in a concurring opinion, writes quote “today’s interim ruling does not decide whether the President may lawfully remove Governor Cook for cause.” And he goes on to say “the ultimate decision about why the President may remove Governor Cook for cause will largely depend on the facts regarding the governor’s actions. And those facts have yet to be determined.”
Justice Clarence Thomas called the ruling “incorrect” in his dissenting opinion. “Although the Court expresses concern that the President removed a Board member for ‘the first time in the Federal Reserve’s 111-year history,’” he wrote, “it expresses no such concern that it today upholds an injunction against the President’s removal of an executive officer for the first time in the Constitution’s 237-year history.”
Well Ms. Cook has been accused of mortgage fraud because she apparently or allegedly took out mortgages in three different states, Michigan, Georgia, and Massachusetts. And then she labeled each one her primary residence.
So if she can’t count or if she can’t read, why are we entrusting her with the monetary power of our currency? Her case was referred to the Justice Department, which I guess opened a criminal investigation into mortgage fraud back in August 2025. Almost a year ago.
Yet nothing’s happened since then. So far as we know, no charges have been brought, no grand jury has been convened, or maybe stuff is going on that we don’t know about. Justice Kavanaugh’s comment suggests Ms. Cook may yet get busted, tossed off the court.
The president wrote on Truth Social that the Supremes just sent it back on a strictly procedural basis, but the issue of firing her for cause was not settled. Sounds like he’s right. Yet here you have an independent agency that’s not so independent, and then you have an independent agency that may be independent, but we don’t actually know. So for now, acceptance is the answer to all my prayers, but I don’t really understand any of it.
