I hope — really I do — that markets aren’t forced to grapple this year with a direct attack from the White House on Fed independence.

Alas, Donald Trump’s spoiling for a fight, and this time it’s not a drill. This isn’t just bullying and tweets. Trump’s actively considering a move against Jerome Powell and unlike similar ruminations in late 2018 and early 2019, this time he may get a tacit green light from the Supreme Court.

I assume most readers have a passing familiarity with the specifics of this exceedingly risky gambit, but if not, allow me to briefly recapitulate.

Earlier this year, Trump unilaterally removed Biden nominee Gwynne Wilcox from the National Labor Relations Board, which has operated without a quorum since. Wilcox sued, and although she was ultimately reinstated by the full Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit, the Supreme Court on April 9 stayed that decision, which also impacts Cathy Harris, a Democrat Trump dismissed from the Merit Systems Protection Board.

Now, the legal community’s on tenterhooks, and if traders and Wall Street “strategists” could see five feet beyond their Bloomies, they’d be nervous too. Because if the Justices take it upon themselves to adjudicate Wilcox’s attempt to retain her seat on the NLRB, the court will, wittingly or not, open the door to a financial meltdown.

John Roberts’s stay suggested he believes the court may ultimately side with Trump, so if markets are truly “efficient,” they’d price high odds of that outcome should the court grant cert. I doubt seriously markets are in fact prepared to make that leap, because… well, because what’s the price for Treasurys in a scenario where Trump can remove Fed Chairs at any time, night or day, for no reason, or simply for failing to cut rates?

If SCOTUS outright overturns Humphrey’s Executor and, by extension, Wiener v. US, the read-through for US monetary policy independence would be disastrous: Trump would, for however long he stays in power, have the authority to remove Fed Chairs at will. Given his mercurial nature, it’s not at all far-fetched to suggest the Fed leadership could change multiple times during a single year.

Remember when, during Trump’s first term, comparisons to Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s iron grip on Turkey’s central bank were derided as overblown fearmongering? Well, how about now? How’s that derision working out in 2025?

Those are rhetorical questions. This is just another example of the extent to which we’ve normalized the aberrant (and the abhorrent) so habitually that we’ve lost track of how far afield we are in America.

To emphasize: The threat to the Fed isn’t a thought experiment anymore. If the Supreme Court takes up the Wilcox case, sides with the administration and there’s no carveout for the Fed, the world would be forced to reckon with the prospect of a Fed Chair that serves completely at the pleasure of Trump. That, in turn, would mean a Fed laboring under constant pressure to cut rates, because failing to do so would result in the overnight sacking of the Chair.

Needless to say, Trump would have a difficult time finding credible people willing to serve in such an arrangement. Sure, it’d look ok at first. Kevin Warsh, for example, would be an acceptable choice. But as soon as hypothetical Fed Chair Warsh, operating in a post-Humphrey’s Executor reality, refused to cut rates fast enough, markets would have to prepare for Fed Chair Stephen Moore. Or Fed Chair Judy Shelton. Or Fed Chair Larry Kudlow, which would at least be funny.

If you think the Senate wouldn’t go along with that, I’ll refer you to Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth. Note that Shelton was a guest Friday on Kudlow’s Fox show. The segment was called “Should Trump Fire Fed Chair Powell?”

As to whether it makes sense for the Supreme Court to endeavor to protect Fed governors while simultaneously giving Trump carte blanche to remove officials at other independent agencies, the answer’s “yes” and “no.”

“Yes,” it makes sense to safeguard monetary policy if you’re determined to do something unconscionably dangerous that might jeopardize Fed independence, but “no” because i) that’d look every bit like the contrived legal acrobatics that it is (or would be), opening the door for Trump to challenge it, and more importantly ii) it’d prompt the still-sane among us — a minority, to be sure — to ask why the Supreme Court would be determined to do something unconscionably dangerous in the first place.

Trump on Thursday talked openly of “terminating” Powell, and according to The Wall Street Journal, he’s deliberated behind the scenes “for months” about such a move. According to the Journal‘s reporting, Trump met at Mar-a-Lago with Warsh “about potentially firing Powell before his term ends and possibly selecting Warsh to be his replacement.”

Asked by a reporter in the Oval Office about Powell’s contention that he wouldn’t leave even if asked, Trump responded, “Oh, he’ll leave. If I want him out, he’ll be out of there real fast. Believe me.” Some might describe that as a thinly-veiled threat of physical violence.

Before you roll your eyes, let me ask you this: If you’re on the town council in New Jersey or, say, occupy an important position in the local zoning office, and you hear that, in response to a question about your position, whoever runs the DeCavalcantes these days said, “Oh, he’ll leave. If I want him out, he’ll be out of there real fast. Believe me.” how are you going to take that?

In any event, I hope someone on the Supreme Court’s apprised of what happens to financial markets if the court opens the door for Trump to remove Fed officials, including the Fed Chair, unilaterally and for no reason.

In remarks to the Economic Club of Chicago this week, Powell said he doesn’t think the Wilcox case applies to the Fed, but as the Journal noted, “Some White House officials have been watching to see whether the court overturns Humphrey’s Executor as they consider the president’s next steps on Powell.”

On Friday, Kevin Hassett confirmed that Trump’s “studying” Powell’s removal. “The policy of this Federal Reserve was to raise rates the minute President Trump was elected last time [and] to say that the supply-side tax cuts were going to be inflationary,” he added.