The US Supreme Court ruled 5-4 on 29 June 2026 that President Donald Trump cannot immediately fire Federal Reserve Governor Lisa Cook, leaving in place a lower-court injunction that had blocked her removal while her lawsuit challenging the dismissal continues. Chief Justice John Roberts wrote the majority opinion, joined by Justice Brett Kavanaugh and the court's three liberal members — Elena Kagan, Sonia Sotomayor and Ketanji Brown Jackson. Justices Clarence Thomas, Samuel Alito, Neil Gorsuch and Amy Coney Barrett dissented.

Roberts wrote that accepting the government's arguments 'would in effect transform the Federal Reserve's for-cause protection into at-will employment,' and that Cook is 'entitled to notice and some opportunity to respond prior to her termination,' stopping short of requiring a full judicial proceeding or a meeting with Trump himself. Kavanaugh, a Trump appointee, wrote that the president's position would 'weaken if not shatter the independence of the Federal Reserve' [Source: Bloomberg]. Trump had argued he sought to fire Cook over mortgage fraud allegations made by Federal Housing Finance Agency Director Bill Pulte, who subsequently filed criminal referrals against Cook with the Justice Department. Cook has denied the allegations.

On the same day, the court issued a separate 6-3 ruling on ideological lines allowing Trump to remove Federal Trade Commission Commissioner Rebecca Kelly Slaughter, overturning the 1935 Humphrey's Executor v. United States precedent that had restricted presidential authority to dismiss FTC members. The court explicitly distinguished the Federal Reserve from other independent agencies in that ruling. Cook, appointed by former President Joe Biden, is the first Black woman to serve as a Fed governor and was the first governor to be fired in the Federal Reserve's 111-year history, according to the Supreme Court opinion syllabus [Source: Supreme Court of the United States (slip opinion 25A312)].

US stocks were higher on 29 June 2026, with the Nasdaq and S&P 500 rising as technology shares led the market. Oil prices were also climbing as Wall Street weighed developments in the US-Iran conflict.

The ruling comes against a backdrop of sustained tension between the Trump administration and the Federal Reserve. Trump moved to fire Cook in late August 2025, prompting her to file a federal lawsuit; she has remained on the board since. In a May 2025 decision allowing Trump to remove members of two labour boards, the Supreme Court had singled out the central bank as a 'uniquely structured, quasi-private entity that follows in the distinct historical tradition of the First and Second Banks' [Source: CBS News]. With the exception of former Chairman Powell, every living current or former Federal Reserve Board chair, along with Treasury secretaries and prominent economists from both parties, signed a Supreme Court brief urging the court not to interfere with the Fed's independence. Powell attended the oral arguments in person in January 2026, the same month he disclosed that the Justice Department had opened a criminal investigation into his congressional testimony about a renovation of the Fed's headquarters. The case now returns to the lower courts for further proceedings.

Sources: The Guardian, Bloomberg, BBC, CNBC, CBS News, NBC News, Fox Business, NPR, Supreme Court of the United States (slip opinion 25A312), TheStreet