The Supreme Court appointed an attorney to represent the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau in the fight over the leadership of the bureau’s constitutionality.
The court appointed Paul Clement, a former U.S. solicitor general under the George W. Bush administration who has appeared more than 95 times before the court for several high-profile cases, to defend the CFPB’s leadership structure.
Cases Clement has been involved in include partisan gerrymandering, same sex marriage and the Affordable Care Act.
Earlier this month, the Supreme Court agreed to hear the case to determine the constitutionality of the leadership of the CFPB.
As it stands now, President Donald Trump cannot fire the CFPB director unless it’s for cause. The previous decision made the CFPB director fireable at will, but that’s not the case anymore as the case continues to be challenged in court.
And now the Supreme Court will have the final say.
But the court had to select the attorney to represent the bureau since the CFPB is no longer advocating for its leadership structure under President Donald Trump’s administration.
CFPB Director Kathy Kraninger is siding against her own bureau, saying, “The bureau should adopt the Department of Justice’s view that the for-cause removal provision is unconstitutional. A Supreme Court decision holding that the for-cause removal provision is unconstitutional should not affect the Bureau’s ability to carry out its important mission.”
The CFPB refused to find a lawyer for the case and even suggested in its brief that the Supreme Court appoint a “friend of the court” to defend the ruling already set by the U.S. Court of Appeals, which declared the CFPB’s leadership unconstitutional.
The CFPB’s leadership structure was previously declared unconstitutional by the Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit in a 2-1 vote.
