President Donald Trump has created a "committee of inquiry" to examine whether Federal Reserve Governor Lisa Cook made false statements on mortgage applications, opening a new front in his effort to remove her from the central bank's board. The White House set a hearing for Nov. 5. It won't be public, but officials will publish a transcript.
In a written memo, Trump said Cook "shall" attend and answer questions. "As President, it is my job to ensure the laws are faithfully executed, including by firing subordinates who cannot be trusted to tell the truth and follow the law," he wrote.
An Unprecedented Push Against a Fed Governor
No president has ever tried this. Trump's attempt to fire Cook from the Fed's seven-member board of governors marks the first time in the central bank's 113-year history that a president has sought to remove a governor. Joe Biden appointed Cook, the first Black woman on the board.
The effort follows Trump's moves against other Black officials, including efforts to oust or indict New York Attorney General Letitia James and Gen. Charles Q. Brown, the former chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff.
Trump first tried to fire Cook in August 2025, alleging mortgage fraud over two properties she listed as her "primary" residence in 2021 applications. Cook denies wrongdoing and hasn't been charged with a crime. Her attorneys, Abbe Lowell and Norman Eisen, say she made an "inadvertent error" and described one property as a vacation home in other documents. "An inadvertent error is not fraud, as the President and a third of his cabinet should know because they reportedly did the same thing," they said in August.
The Supreme Court ruled in June that Cook could keep her job, though a footnote said nothing prevented Trump from "trying again" if she received proper notice and a chance to respond. The court said a for-cause firing requires an alleged offense that is serious and related to the official's job.
A Process Critics Question
The inquiry panel includes Kevin Hassett, the president's top economic adviser, who has often echoed Trump's criticisms of the Fed. Keith Sonderling, acting director of the Office of Government Ethics, and Andrea Lucas, chair of the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, also sit on it.
Scott Alvarez, a former chief counsel for the Fed, said President William Howard Taft established a similar commission in 1912 to remove two officials from an independent agency. Alvarez said Trump's version goes beyond the process the Supreme Court described. "It's an attempt to show that he's really giving Cook as much process as possible," he said, adding that the allegations didn't appear to meet the court's "for cause" standard.
Jaret Seiberg of TD Cowen's Washington Research Group put it more bluntly. "We do not see why the White House would start this process if it were not trying to create a way to justify removing Cook from her job," he wrote in a client note.
Cook's lawyers are weighing whether she'll appear. "We have engaged with the White House to evaluate whether the process proposed has a possibility of being a genuine one and not simply a box checking exercise," they said. The Fed declined to comment.
The backdrop matters. Trump has repeatedly demanded lower interest rates, yet the Fed raised its key rate last month under Chairman Kevin Warsh, whom Trump appointed earlier this year. The Sept. 16 vote was unanimous. Trump and some advisers blamed the broader rate-setting committee. Cook is one of its 12 voting members.
A Diesel Deal With Moscow
Separately, Trump announced a deal with Russian President Vladimir Putin to obtain Russian diesel, reversing years of U.S. pressure on Moscow over its war with Ukraine. Trump said on social media that Russia would immediately supply more than 300,000 tons, then 500,000 tons in November, 1 million tons "immediately thereafter" and another 3 million tons "within a short period of time."
He tied the deal to pocketbook pressure ahead of the midterms. "Lower prices for Americans, especially our Great Farmers, Ranchers, and Truckers, is my Greatest Priority," Trump said. AAA put the U.S. national average for diesel at $6.28 a gallon Friday, after it hit a record $6.52 on Sept. 22. The White House didn't say who would pay for the fuel, when it would arrive, or whether November supplies would land before Election Day on Nov. 3.
Trump announced the deal after signing a sweeping Russia sanctions law last month, one meant to curb the energy revenues that help fund Russia's war. He didn't address the sanctions or the war in his post. Shortly afterward, the Treasury Department issued a temporary license allowing Russian diesel to reach global markets. Under the license, U.S. sanctions won't apply until April 2027 to diesel loaded onto tankers as of Friday. It's the first such license since the Ukraine war began to ease diesel sanctions for longer than the standard 30-day period.
Ukraine's Reaction
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy called it "a weak decision, unfortunately, a weak decision by strong partners." Trump's envoy Steve Witkoff and son-in-law Jared Kushner were meeting Ukrainian officials in Miami on a proposal to end the war when the deal came out. "I believe our team is simply being used as a smokescreen. And that is certainly not fair. It is certainly not how partners should treat each other," Zelenskyy said.
He warned Russia would repay the deal "with further terror and perfidy," calling it something that lets Moscow "kill more, wage war for longer, have even less respect for America."
Rep. Don Beyer, the senior House Democrat on the Joint Economic Committee, called the announcement "infuriating." "This is what we warned anyone who would listen: Trump isn't the slightest bit trustworthy when it comes to Russia," he said on X.
The practical payoff remains murky. Michael Lynch of the Energy Policy Research Foundation said it's "kind of shuffling deck chairs on the Titanic." If the U.S. gets Russian diesel, he said, Russia's existing customers will go elsewhere, "and that will keep the price basically where it is now."
The Kremlin said Trump and Putin gave "significant attention to the prospects of resolving the Ukrainian crisis." Russian Deputy Prime Minister Alexander Novak said Moscow was lifting diesel export restrictions ahead of schedule and could begin U.S. supplies in October.
Why This Matters:
Two stories, one pattern: executive power bending toward short-term political goals. Cook's case tests whether a president can reshape an independent central bank by setting up a process aimed at a predetermined outcome. Analysts say the allegations don't appear to meet the Supreme Court's "for cause" bar, and the effort targets the first Black woman to serve on the board. The diesel deal poses a different accountability question. A bipartisan sanctions law, signed only last month, now sits in doubt while a longtime ally says it's being used as a "smokescreen." Americans paying $6.28 for diesel deserve relief, but experts warn this deal may not deliver it, and it hands Moscow revenue and leverage.