Lisa Cook takes the oath of office to serve as a member of the Board of Governors at the Federal Reserve System during a ceremony at the William McChesney Martin Jr. Building of the Federal Reserve May 23, 2022 in Washington, DC.
Drew Angerer | Getty Images
Every living former chair of the Federal Reserve, as well as a slew of ex-Treasury secretaries and former White House economic advisors, urged the Supreme Court on Thursday to block President Donald Trump from firing Fed Governor Lisa Cook as her lawsuit challenging her removal proceeds.
The signers said in a legal brief, “The independence of the Federal Reserve, within the limited authority granted by Congress to achieve the goals Congress itself has set, is a critical feature of our national monetary system.”
“Allowing the removal of Governor Lisa D. Cook while the challenge to her removal is pending would threaten that independence and erode public confidence in the Fed,” the amicus brief said.
Signers of the brief included the former Fed chairs Alan Greenspan, Ben Bernanke, Janet Yellen; former Treasury secretaries Robert Rubin, Larry Summers, Hank Paulson, Jack Lew, and Timothy Geithner; former White House Council of Economic Advisers chairs Glenn Hubbard, Greg Mankiw, Christina Romer, Cecilia Rouse, Jared Bernstein, and Jason Furman; and former Fed Governor Dan Tarullo.
Members of the group had served under, and been appointed by, both Democratic and Republican presidents.
The economists Ken Rogoff, Phil Gramm, and John Cochrane also signed the brief, as did Phil Gramm, a Republican who previously served as chairman of the Senate Banking Committee.
The brief said that allowing Cook to be removed now “would expose the Federal Reserve to political influences, thereby eroding public confidence in the Fed’s independence and jeopardizing the credibility
and efficacy of U.S. monetary policy.”
The filing comes as Cook’s lawyers face a 4 p.m. ET Thursday deadline to respond to arguments by the Justice Department that Trump should be allowed to remove her from the seven-member Fed Board of Governors while the Supreme Court considers whether the president has legal cause to fire her.
Trump said on Aug. 25 that he was firing Cook because of allegations that she committed mortgage fraud in connection with applications she filed for two residential properties she owns. Cook denies any wrongdoing.
Cook sued Trump in U.S. District Court in Washington, D.C., asking a judge to block her removal.
That judge on Sept. 9 barred Trump from firing Cook as her suit plays out. A three-judge panel on the federal appeals court in D.C., in a split decision, later upheld that order.
Trump then asked the Supreme Court to lift those rulings and allow him to remove Cook.
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