Donald Trump still wants to commandeer the Fed board.

In other words: The Supreme Court’s half-hearted defense of monetary policy independence in the US — which was really just a grudging affirmation of Lisa Cook’s right to due process — did little to dissuade a would-be autocrat who, this go round, came in with a plan.

Unlike first-term Trump, second-term Trump’s following a blueprint for power consolidation: Project 2025. That document, you’re reminded, includes any number of “suggestions” for hijacking the bureaucracy and capturing technocratic organs of the state. It was no coincidence that Russ Vought, one of Project 2025’s chief architects, helped lay the legal groundwork for Trump’s unsuccesful attempt to prosecute Jerome Powell.

As discussed at length in the first linked article above, Cook’s Fed board seat isn’t safe following the SCOTUS decision. All that ruling did was remind Trump that Cook’s entitled to the same rights as everyone else, much as that surely pains a lot of conservatives for whom the very presence of a black woman on the board of an institution as critical as the Fed is a two-fold affront to the subtext of America’s founding principles. (In a little-discussed footnote, Thomas Jefferson wrote, “Does not apply to human property, de jure or de facto.”)

The court’s ad hoc “Fed exception,” first delineated in May of 2025 to preemptively guard against a market meltdown in the event the justices decided to overturn Humphrey’s Executor, is extremely vulnerable to being tossed aside by the court if Trump can find someone capable of arguing it. (It shouldn’t be hard. The exception’s weak. Any competent solicitor general should have no trouble making the case, particularly now that Humphrey’s is gone.)

To reiterate: All SCOTUS really said last week was that Cook would be entitled to due process anyway, but because the Fed’s such a critical and unique institution, denying it was doubly dangerous because in addition to the bad optics around stripping her of the procedural rights all Americans supposedly have, Trump’s attempt to remove her from the Fed for “cause” without affording her an opportunity to defend herself, risked undermining faith in the money.

With all of that in mind, Bloomberg reported that the Trump administration fully intends to pursue the Cook case and, possibly, avenues for removing Powell, whose decision to remain on the board after his term as chair expired made the enmity with Trump worse.

“Top officials and outside allies are actively exploring ways to remove members of the Fed’s Board of Governors to clear the way for more of the president’s own picks,” Bloomberg’s Saleha Mohsin and Joshua Green wrote, adding that Trump was “particularly upset” about Powell’s JFK Profile in Courage Award.

In his acceptance speech for the JFK honor, Powell emphasized the importance of shielding not only the Fed, but of protecting colleges, think tanks, Congress, the court system and the Constitution itself from presidential overreach.

The same linked Bloomberg piece said Trump and Scott Bessent are “turning increasing attention” to the appointment process for the 12 regional Fed bank chiefs. Some in Trump’s circle see a vacancy at the Atlanta Fed as “an opportunity to install an ideologically aligned pick.”

Recall that the main concern around Trump’s efforts to hijack the board is the possibility that he — or future presidents — could leverage a de facto board majority to veto regional Fed bank appointments.

None of this is lost on SCOTUS’s conservatives, of course. But considering the blatant disregard they’ve frequently exhibited for congressional authority and, more pointedly, their willingness even to cede their own jurisdiction to Trump, no one should be surprised if they eventually toss the “exception” that shields the Fed in the wake of the decision to overturn Humphrey’s.

Late last week, in an interview with CNBC, Trump said of Warsh, “He’s got a board that maybe is a little bit hostile. And maybe a board that wants to do the wrong thing.”