Late Monday evening Donald Trump issued a statement declaring that he would fire Lisa Cook, a member of the Federal Reserve Board of Governors.
Unable do to so without cause under law, the president cited a criminal referral made to the Justice Department by William Pulte, a Trump appointee without a law enforcement background. Cook is not charged (yet) with any crimes.
On Tuesday, attorney Abbe Lowell announced that he was representing Cook and criticized the administration, calling her firing "illegal".
"President Trump has no authority to remove Federal Reserve Governor Lisa Cook," said Lowell, who launched a firm earlier this year specially for the purpose of representing federal workers targeted in political firings by Trump and his team.
"His attempt to fire her, based solely on a referral letter, lacks any factual or legal basis. We will be filing a lawsuit challenging this illegal action."
At a marathon Cabinet meeting on Thursday that lasted for more than three hours, Trump commented on his attempt to fire Cook: "She seems to have had an infraction, and she can't have an infraction, especially that infraction."
"Because she's in charge of, if you think about it, mortages. And we need people that are 100% above board, and it doesn't seem like she was," the president continued.
His rambling, off-topic diatribes during Tuesday's meeting led cable networks to drop coverage of the event, while California Gov. Gavin Newsom accused the president of showing signs of dementia.
The firing is the first test of the weight that one of Pulte's criminal referrals for mortage fraud actually holds.
"The President fired Cook for 'sufficient cause,' which makes her case different from past cases where the President removed officials solely for policy disagreements," Chad Squitieri, an associate professor of law at the Catholic University of America told Inside Washington on Tuesday.
"Claiming cause should greatly improve the President's chances of success at the Supreme Court. Although the Supreme Court has signaled an interest in limiting the President's ability to fire Federal Reserve officials without cause, firings for cause are an entirely different story."
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