The Supreme Court on Monday blocked President Trump from firing Federal Reserve Governor Lisa Cook in a 5-4 decision affirming the central bank's insulation from the White House, and in a separate 6-3 ruling the same day handed the president sweeping new authority to dismiss members of every other independent regulatory agency, overturning a 91-year-old precedent.

The paired decisions, both written by Chief Justice John Roberts, leave the Federal Reserve as a singular exception in a federal regulatory architecture remade in a single morning. The Federal Trade Commission, the National Labor Relations Board, the Federal Communications Commission and the Consumer Product Safety Commission can now be reshaped at will by any sitting president. The Fed cannot — at least not without the due process Cook was denied.

The Cook ruling

The court rejected Trump's emergency bid to pause a lower-court order keeping Cook on the Federal Reserve Board while her lawsuit proceeds. Roberts was joined by fellow conservative Brett Kavanaugh and the court's three liberal justices, Elena Kagan, Sonia Sotomayor and Ketanji Brown Jackson. The four other conservatives dissented.

Trump moved to fire Cook in August 2025 over allegations from Federal Housing Finance Agency Director Bill Pulte that she had filed mortgage documents listing two different principal residences. Cook, an appointee of former President Joe Biden and the first Black woman to serve as a Fed governor, has denied the allegations. Her term runs until 2038.

"Not only the fact of independence but also the appearance of independence is key to the Federal Reserve's design," Roberts wrote. He added that "Any change in that scheme must come from Congress, not the courts."

A Roberts footnote left open the possibility that Trump could try again if he affords Cook the evidence, response window and procedural steps the Federal Reserve Act requires. Trump signaled within hours that he would. "We will take appropriate action immediately to make sure that someone who has committed wrongdoing will not be making vital decisions concerning the Welfare of the United States of America," he wrote on Truth Social. Pulte, now also director of national intelligence, said on X that he believes Cook "will be indicted for mortgage fraud."

Cook called the firing attempt "a manufactured pretext because I refused to bow to political pressure and continued to set interest rates based only on what would best serve the American people."

Humphrey's Executor falls

The second ruling concerned Trump's March 2025 dismissal of FTC Commissioner Rebecca Slaughter, a Democratic appointee whose termination letter said her service was "inconsistent with [the] Administration's priorities." Lower courts had reinstated her, citing the 1935 decision in Humphrey's Executor, which held that Congress could shield members of multimember independent commissions from at-will removal.

Roberts, writing for a six-justice majority, ruled that protection unconstitutional. "Subordinates who exercise the President's power are subject to removal by him," he wrote, adding that "If anything more is left of Humphrey's, the Court overrules it." He noted the FTC enforces some 80 statutes spanning nearly the entire economy.

Sotomayor called the decision "grievously wrong" and wrote that "the majority replaces 90 years of proven, workable practice with a half-baked theory of executive power that is simultaneously all encompassing yet also subject to necessary but undefined exceptions."

The ruling effectively converts commissioners at the FTC, NLRB, FCC, Securities and Exchange Commission, Consumer Product Safety Commission, Equal Employment Opportunity Commission and Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation into at-will employees of the president. It also nullifies the statutory bipartisan-balance requirement at agencies like the FTC, where Congress capped each party at three of five seats.

What the Street sees

Financial analysts read the split as a partial firewall around monetary policy and a green light for regulatory turnover everywhere else. "We view the Cook decision as restricting the ability of the President to remove Federal Reserve governors," Jaret Seiberg of TD Cowen wrote in a note Monday. Mark Zandi, chief economist at Moody's, told CNBC the alternative — a Fed responsive to short-term political demands for lower rates — would have been "a much darker scenario." David Wessel of the Brookings Institution said the FTC ruling means businesses should expect "a pendulum swing" in regulation with each change of administration.

Trump celebrated the FTC decision on Truth Social, calling it a "BIG WIN" and "one of the most important ever given with respect to Presidential Powers." Sen. Elizabeth Warren, D-Mass., responded that "Even a Supreme Court stacked by Donald Trump agrees that his attempt to fire Lisa Cook was illegal," and called for Pulte's removal.

The dissent

The Cook dissenters pulled in opposite directions. Justice Samuel Alito, joined by Justice Neil Gorsuch, argued the majority should not have issued so broad an opinion at the emergency-docket stage. Justice Clarence Thomas went further. "Today's decision is an unprecedented incursion on the Executive Branch," Thomas wrote, calling the majority's case for an independent central bank "ultimately arguments against the Constitution." James M. Burnham, an attorney who has served in both Trump administrations, told NPR that "I don't think there is such a thing as an independent agency because everything has to be in one of the three branches of government." That view, once a conservative minority position, now commands six votes at the court.

The justices wrap their term this week before the summer recess. On Tuesday, they are scheduled to rule on Trump's executive order ending birthright citizenship.