Good Monday evening. In this edition: Supreme Court expands presidential power over independent agencies, except the Fed, while allowing late-arriving mail-in ballots.
Plus, Iran war, housing bill and Gallego.
Supreme Court
The Supreme Court handed President Trump a mixed bag of rulings, expanding the president's power over independent agencies — so long as it's not the Federal Reserve — while also allowing election officials to count late-arriving mail-in ballots.
The decisions came on the second-to-last day of the current Supreme Court term, which is expected to end with a ruling on the president's attempt to end the practice of birthright citizenship.
Justices ruled 6–3, along ideological lines, in Trump v. Slaughter that President Trump can fire members of independent agencies that Congress designed to be free of political influence, greatly expanding the president's power.
The ruling upended the 91-year-old precedent, known as Humphrey's Executor, that independent agency commissioners could not be fired without specific cause.
Last year, President Trump sought to fire Lisa Slaughter, a Democratic member of the Federal Trade Commission (FTC), without providing any reason except that her remaining at the regulatory agency would be "inconsistent with [his] Administration's priorities."
Ms. Slaughter sued, saying the firing violated a federal law — later upheld in Humphrey's Executor v. United States — that barred the president from firing members of the FTC except in cases of "inefficiency, neglect of duty, or malfeasance in office."
A federal district court ordered the Trump administration to reinstate her, and a divided appeals court rejected the administration's request to pause the ruling while it appealed to the high court.
Chief Justice John Roberts, writing for the majority, said the law and the high court's previous ruling in Humphrey's violated the Constitution, which he argued the Framers designed to ensure one person, the president, was in charge of the Executive Branch.
"The FTC unquestionably exercises executive power, and must therefore be controlled by the Chief Executive, in whom such power is vested," he wrote.
"Subordinates who exercise the President's power are subject to removal by him. Then, and only then, can they remain accountable to the President, and the President to the people."
Justice Sonia Sotomayor, dissenting on behalf of the court's two other liberals, argued that Congress designed agencies like the FTC to be independent, and that the majority ruling would "[shift] tremendous power over broad swaths of American life into the President's hands."
"The Court gives the President a power unknown even to the English Crown against which the Founders revolted, elevating him above his once-coequal branches by transforming a duty to take care that the laws be faithfully executed into a license to act in defiance of those very laws," she wrote.
President Trump called it a "BIG WIN" that confirmed his power as president.
"This Decision was long sought by United States Presidents, dating all the way back to the 1930s," he wrote on social media. "It is such an Honor to be the sitting President who won this Historic and Unprecedented Ruling, one of the most important ever given with respect to Presidential Powers."
However, in a separate 5–4 ruling in Trump v. Cook, justices blocked President Trump from firing Lisa Cook as a governor of the Federal Reserve while a lawsuit challenging her dismissal plays out in the courts.
The president sought to fire Ms. Cook last August, accusing her of committing mortgage fraud, as part of his pressure campaign on the central bank to lower interest rates.
Ms. Cook sued and a federal court agreed, allowing her to remain on the central bank as she continued to challenge her dismissal.
Chief Justice John Roberts, again writing for the majority, said that the president did not give Ms. Cook an opportunity to respond to the allegations and that allowing him to fire her now would erode the independence of the central bank.
"Any change in that scheme must come from Congress, not the courts," he wrote. "That is why we cannot accept the Government's contentions in this case. To do so would allow the President to remove a member of the Federal Reserve at any time, for any reason, without any notice before, and without any judicial check after."
Four of the court's conservatives objected, with Justice Clarence Thomas calling it an "unprecedented incursion on the Executive Branch."
"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."
Separately, in a 5–4 decision in Watson v. Republican National Committee, justices ruled that election officials may count mail-in ballots that arrive after Election Day if they are postmarked on or before Election Day and received within five business days.
The decision reversed an appeals court ruling that sided with the Mississippi Republican Party, which challenged the pandemic-era law on the grounds that it ran afoul of an 1845 federal law designating the Tuesday after the first Monday in November as "election day."
Justice Amy Coney Barrett, writing for the majority, said that the "defining element of an 'election' ... has always been the electorate's choice of candidate."
"The electorate's choice is made when voting is complete, not when ballots are received," she said. "The election-day statutes say nothing about ballot receipt, and we cannot add to the words Congress chose."
Justices Samuel Alito, Clarence Thomas, Neil Gorsuch and Brett Kavanaugh dissented.
"[F]rom this Nation's founding until the last few decades of the 20th century — a period that spans the enactment of all three election-day statutes — having an 'election' on a particular day meant completing ballot collection on that day," Justice Alito wrote for the minority.
President Trump called the ruling a "tremendous loss," and said it was now "more important than ever" for Congress to pass the SAVE America Act, which, among other provisions, would ban most mail-in ballots.
The U.S. and Iran are expected to hold talks in Qatar on Tuesday following a weekend of renewed attacks that threatened to unravel the fragile ceasefire reached two weeks ago. Iran attacked a cargo ship in the Strait of Hormuz on Thursday and another vessel on Saturday, prompting retaliatory American strikes. The Iranian military then targeted a U.S. naval base in Bahrain and a Kuwaiti air base in response. On Sunday, the U.S. said the countries had agreed to hold off on further attacks and allow shipping vessels to move freely through the strait. The renewed fighting caused traffic through the strait to drop significantly over the weekend. Meanwhile, Israel said it struck three Hezbollah sites in Lebanon on Sunday in response to what it said were attacks on Israeli soldiers.
President Trumpsaid he hasn't decided whether he will sign the bipartisan housing bill, calling it a "big yawn" compared to the SAVE America Act, his voting restrictions bill that he wants Congress to pass. "It's a yawn. Some people say it's wonderful. To me, compared to the SAVE America Act, just about everything is a big yawn," he said in the Oval Office. Congress approved the housing bill with overwhelming bipartisan majorities last week, touting it as a key measure to address Americans' affordability concerns. But the president abruptly canceled a signing ceremony for the bill, demanding that Congress first pass the SAVE America Act, which lacks enough support to pass the Senate. If the president takes no action, the housing bill will become law 10 days after it is formally sent to the White House. Alternatively, he could veto it, requiring a two-thirds vote in both chambers of Congress to override the veto and enact the bill into law.
The Senate Ethics Committeedismissed allegations of misconduct by Sen. Ruben Gallego (D-AZ) after conducting an investigation based on a complaint submitted by Rep. Anna Paulina Luna (R-FL). "Specifically, the complaint alleged campaign finance violations and inappropriate conduct of a sexual nature," the six-member panel wrote to the senator. "Based on the investigation of the Committee, the Committee did not find evidence that your actions violated Federal law, Senate Rules, or related standards of conduct." Sen. Gallego welcomed the letter, calling the allegations "right-wing conspiracy theories." "I look forward to an apology from Rep. Luna for weaponizing the ethics process while refusing to investigate historic corruption that's making life harder for families," he said on social media.
For your radar…
Maggie Haberman and Jonathan Swan, correspondents for the New York Times, discuss their new book on the Trump administration as part of an interview on C-SPAN's "Q&A," airing Monday night. Watch on C-SPAN at 9pm ET.
White House Budget Director Russell Vought testifies Tuesday before a House Appropriations subcommittee. Watch LIVE on C-SPAN2 at 10am ET.
