Cook, Slaughter rulings protect the wealthy | In Focus

Published 1:00 pm Wednesday, July 8, 2026

In the last days of the Supreme Court’s 2025-2026 term, the justices made two decisions: one about the power of the president in relation to government independent agencies and another about the importance of the Federal Reserve’ independence.

The decisions appeared to be contradictory, but they are not.

Both cases, Trump vs. Cook and Trump vs. Slaughter, involved women who Trump fired. In both cases the issue was an attempt by the President to expand his powers over the legislature and over the nation’s economy.

Trump didn’t challenge the law requiring firing “for cause.” Instead, he asserted that the president decides what “for cause” means. Trump, by firing these two women, is asserting that these two government agencies have exercised too much power and they need to be reined in by the elected president.

In Federal Reserve governor Lisa Cook’s firing, the conservative justices argued that the Federal Reserve predated the Federal Trade Commission, which was created during the Great Depression (by a Democratic controlled Congress and a Democratic president).

Depression era legislation symbolized the rejection of laissez faire conservative government where the government stayed out of the affairs of the economy—except to protect businesses from the power of labor unions, deny the 40-hour work week, or promote safety standards for workers.

Ironically, since the conservative SCOTUS majority favors billionaires, keeping the Federal Reserve independent would protect elite wealth. The memory of the loss of fortunes during the Crash of ’29 is still remembered. Therefore, the SCOTUS majority realized the need for government regulation of the economy. Protecting the Fed’s independence is mandatory to protecting elite wealth.

The independent Federal Trade Commission (F.T.C.), directly “protect[s] consumers and promotes fair competition in the marketplace. It aims to prevent anticompetitive, deceptive, and fraudulent business practices through law enforcement, rulemaking and public education” (google.com). These regulations and regulators diminish the wealth of the elites, something the conservative majority deeply cares about, so it makes sense that our president would want to fire Rebecca Slaughter, a member of the F.T.C.

• It is no coincidence that both firings, involved women. In Cook’s case, she is both Black and female. She is also the only Black female on the Federal Reserve Board.
• The Roberts’ Court has clearly demonstrated its racism when it gutted the Voting Rights Act of 1965 with its Louisiana v. Callais decision, and in upholding a judicially determined racist gerrymander in Alabama shortly afterward. “Now we know: “Today is the day the SCOTUS took the remaining life out of the VRA,” Kareem Crayton, vice president of the Brennan Center for Justice’s Washington, D.C., office, said in a statement. “Despite the clearest evidence of intentional race discrimination by [Alabama]… the Court now rewards a state that openly defied a court order. Cold work” (Democracy Docket. June 6, 2026).

This desire on the part of the President and the conservative SCOTUS majority is to protect the wealthy white elites at the expense of average Americans. Expect to see more blanket firings of Democrats and experts on the National Labor Relations Board in the days and months to come: Expect to see partisan firings in the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, which is dedicated to protection of consumers from unfair, deceptive, or abusive financial practices and products. Other agencies threatened include those that deal with grantmaking in science and medicine like the National Institute of Health, and the Nuclear Regulatory Commission.

All told, the president will now have power over almost two dozen Congressionally created agencies.

One thing seems clear: Conservatives are against experts in all government agencies and departments. Think of the DOJ, the Department of Defense, ICE, and even the Director of National Intelligence where up to five hundred CIA agents’ jobs are on the chopping block.

As I wrote in my last column, we are living in the Second Gilded Age. The SCOTUS decisions both on Cook and Slaughter on the surface seem inconsistent when compared to each other. Cook’s job was protected, while Slaughter was fired. But, when we delve deeper into the common thread of protecting the wealthy elites at the expense of average Americans, the decisions are very consistent.

SCOTUS, by its recent decisions, has set the stage for the next president, likely a Democrat, to exercise the expanded power of the presidency. It will be interesting to see whether the conservative SCOTUS justices will then try to rein in the Democrats, or whether they will act consistently based upon this year’s precedent-breaking decisions.

We will all get to find out.

Richard Elfers is a columnist, a former Enumclaw City Council member and a Green River College professor.