White House halts war on Trump foe after Tuesday drubbing

Bloomberg reports President Donald Trump appears to have put his war on Federal Reserve Governor Lisa Cook on hold this week after Democrats swept Republicans out of their House and Senate majorities.

Lawyers for the U.S. Justice Department actually joined Cook’s attorneys in asking a federal judge to put the legal battle over Trump’s scheme to fire Cook on hold as the White House prepares to set a hearing on the litigation in December.

“Legal teams for DOJ and Cook filed a brief, joint report on Friday to U.S. District Judge Jia Cobb saying the court should pause upcoming deadlines and that they’d come back to her with another update in early January,” reports Bloomberg.

Trump announced that he was firing Cook “effective immediately,” citing allegations of mortgage fraud. If successful, Cook’s removal would allow Trump to select a replacement more open to interest rate cuts.

Cook has denied wrongdoing, and she has accused Trump of trying to remove her in a bid to undermine the central bank’s independence. Trump has openly attacked both Cook and former Chair Jerome Powell for refusing his demand to cut interest rates.

Critics like Bulwark correspondent Andrew Egger described Trump’s pretext for removing Cook as “ridiculous.”

“Trump has relied on a loyal functionary wielding a formerly nonpartisan executive-branch post as a political weapon,” said Egger, referring to Federal Housing Finance Agency Director Bill Pulte, who submitted the research to the White House suggesting a possible argument against Cook.

The U.S. Supreme Court sided against Trump earlier this year, ruling that Trump failed to give Cook a legitimate opportunity to defend herself before initially trying to fire her last year. And the justices allowed Cook to stay in her post and bounced the case back to Judge Cobb.

The conservative-leaning Roberts Court has rarely hesitated to cede Trump new power in his first nine months of office, particularly when it comes to firing federal employees or inhibiting the work of federal agencies created by Congress. The Court has granted the Trump administration requests to block lower court rulings in more than 70 percent of cases brought by the administration that were decided via the shadow docket.

Nevertheless, the litigious president revived his effort to oust her in August. Bloomberg reports that there’s been “no action in the case in the months that followed,” and Cobb, is likely to keep the proceedings frozen as long as the government and Cook agree that’s the best course of action.

But the case appears to be heading to a stalemate, as Bloomberg reports Trump “convened a White House committee to investigate whether he has ‘cause’ to remove her — specifically digging into the unproven mortgage-fraud allegations Trump relied on to fire her the first time.

The panel is set to meet Dec. 14, according to a White House official. At this point, Cook and the White House are discussing the “specifics and details” for how Trump’s “committee of inquiry” will proceed, the lawyers wrote in Friday’s filing.