The U.S. Supreme Court on Wednesday appeared reluctant to let President Donald Trump immediately oust Federal Reserve Gov. Lisa Cook, with multiple justices expressing doubts about administration claims of broad presidential removal power over the central bank.

The justices on Wednesday seemed hesitant to accept the solicitor general's arguments that President Trump's attempted firing of Lisa Cook should be allowed to take effect. (AP Photo/Manuel Balce Ceneta, File) During a two-hour hearing, justices on both the conservative and liberal wings of the high court signaled concerns with key arguments from U.S. Solicitor General D. John Sauer in favor of allowing Trump's attempted firing of Cook to take effect.

Justices pressed Sauer with questions about whether Cook was afforded adequate opportunity to rebut mortgage fraud allegations that Trump cited last summer in moving to dismiss her, and whether those allegations provided sufficient "cause" for her removal as required under the Federal Reserve Act.

Justices also voiced skepticism of the administration's position that courts lack authority to keep Cook in her job and seemed troubled by the prospect of having to rule on the case at such an early stage, without full factual development or final judgment.

"Is there any reason why this whole matter had to be handled by everybody — by the executive branch, by the district court, by the D.C. Circuit — in such a hurried manner?" Justice Samuel Alito asked Sauer at one point. "You began by laying out what you claim to be the factual basis for the for-cause removal, but no court has ever explored those facts. Are [Cook's] mortgage applications even in the record in this case?"

In another exchange with Sauer, Chief Justice John Roberts appeared to suggest the administration was trying to have it both ways by arguing Trump had valid cause to remove Cook while at the same time insisting courts cannot undo an improper removal.

"If you're correct that courts do not have the authority to reinstate a removed officer, why are we wasting our time wondering if there's cause or not?" the chief justice asked.

Sauer squared off at Wednesday's hearing with veteran appellate litigator Paul Clement of Clement & Murphy LLC, who argued for Cook.

The hearing came as the Supreme Court weighs an emergency appeal from the U.S. Department of Justice in litigation over Trump's effort to fire Cook from the Fed's board, whose members are removable only "for cause" under the Federal Reserve Act.

Last summer, Trump announced over social media that he was firing Cook for alleged misconduct tied to two mortgages she took out before joining the Fed. Cook was accused of falsely claiming both mortgaged properties as her primary residence to get better terms.

Cook has not been charged and has denied wrongdoing, saying she at most made an "inadvertent" paperwork mistake. She has also pointed to Trump's demands for lower Fed rates, casting the fraud allegations as a "baseless" and "pretextual" attempt to can her.

In September, Cook filed a lawsuit challenging her removal and quickly secured a preliminary injunction allowing her to remain on the Fed's board for now. A divided D.C. Circuit panel declined to lift this lower-court order, prompting the DOJ to appeal for a stay.

The case has been closely watched because of its unprecedented nature — no other president has ever fired a sitting Fed governor — as well as its potential implications for Fed independence, long viewed as crucial for fostering price stability and market confidence.

Although the Supreme Court has given Trump a wide berth to oust leaders of other traditionally independent agencies since last year, an array of economists, academics and former government officials have warned that allowing him to summarily oust Cook could jeopardize the Fed's autonomy and risk broader, longer-term economic damage.

At Wednesday's hearing, Sauer argued that leaving Cook in place would pose the greater potential danger. Not only does blocking her removal undermine the president's authority to police misconduct by senior officials, but it also threatens to do "grievous, irreparable injury to the public perception of the Federal Reserve," he said.

Fed governors "set interest rates for ordinary Americans all across the country, and here, there's the appearance of having played fast and loose, or at least been grossly negligent in getting favorable interest rates for herself," Sauer told the justices. "What's the message for ordinary Americans that comes out of that?"

He also pushed back on what he described as "predictions of doom" for financial markets if Cook's removal is permitted to move forward. Contrary to "elite opinion" on her side, stocks actually rose in the days after Trump announced he had fired her, Sauer said.

But Justice Amy Coney Barrett did not seem particularly reassured. "I don't want to be in the business of predicting exactly what the market's going to do," she said, adding that she is a "judge, not an economist."

If there is a risk of stoking market turmoil, "doesn't that counsel in the stay posture, when the equities are at stake, caution on our part?" Justice Barrett asked.

In addition, both Justice Barrett and Justice Roberts sounded skeptical that Cook's alleged misconduct was as serious as the administration contends, with Justice Brett Kavanaugh going further to characterize it as reflecting a "very low bar" for removal.

"Your position that there's no judicial review, no process required, no remedy available, a very low bar for cause that the president alone determines — that would weaken, if not shatter, the independence of the Federal Reserve," Justice Kavanaugh told Sauer.

"If this were set as a precedent," he continued, "then we're really at at-will removal … We have to be aware of what we're doing and the consequences of your position for the structure of the government."

Faced with such stakes, more than one justice seemed inclined to dispose of the case with a narrow ruling that would avoid the complications of trying to fully define Trump's authority to remove Fed officials, particularly given the case's preliminary and expedited posture.

Justice Elena Kagan explicitly raised that possibility, asking whether the court could resolve the case "without having to confront the question of exactly what the for-cause standard means."

That approach could allow Cook to remain in place while the litigation continues on remand, preserving the status quo at the Fed and giving lower courts more of a chance to flesh out factual and legal issues surrounding her removal.

One option, Clement said, would be to rule that Cook did not receive the due process she was entitled to before Trump moved to fire her. At a minimum, she was owed formal notice of the allegations against her, a hearing to address them and a "decision-maker who hasn't prejudged the issue," he said.

Alternatively, Clement suggested ruling that removal requires something more serious than unproven, apparent misconduct or gross negligence, pitching this as a cleaner off-ramp that could cut down on the potential for recurring litigation over the parameters of "cause."

"In the long run, it will be better to make clear that in the context of this unique institution, with its distinct history, that 'for cause' is several steps north of gross negligence," he said. "That's going to make it really something that the courts aren't going to have to get dragged into on a routine basis, whereas I think the lower the standard is, the more likely you are to have removals in the future."

Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson, meanwhile, floated denying the DOJ's stay bid without reaching the merits of Cook's removal. Trump must satisfy every element required for this emergency relief, so the court could rule simply that the administration failed to show greater relative harm from leaving Cook in place for now, she argued.

"Look, it's an emergency application. You could deny it without opinion," Clement told the justices. "I mean, that would be a little strange at this juncture, but it is an extraordinary application made on a preliminary record," he said. "You have a lot of optionality."

The Trump administration is represented by D. John Sauer, Brett A. Shumate, Sarah M. Harris, Yaakov M. Roth, Vivek Suri, Mark R. Freeman, Michael S. Raab, Daniel Aguilar and Laura E. Myron of the U.S. Department of Justice.

Cook is represented by Abbe David Lowell, David A. Kolansky, Isabella M. Oishi, Jack Bolen and Schuyler Standley of Lowell & Associates PLLC, Norman L. Eisen and Tianna J. Mays of the Democracy Defenders Fund, Paul D. Clement and C. Harker Rhodes IV of Clement & Murphy PLLC and Ephraim A. McDowell, Joshua Revesz, Elias S. Kim and Miranda Li of Cooley LLP.

The case is Trump v. Cook, application number 25A312, in the Supreme Court of the United States.