XPost: alt.fan.rush-limbaugh, alt.politics   
   From: super70s@super70s.invalid   
      
   Trump eyes outlandish lawsuit against the Fed's Powell, alleging 'incompetence'   
   "We're going to probably bring a lawsuit against him," the president   
   said, referring to an unlikely civil suit against the Federal Reserve   
   chairman.   
   By Steve Benen   
   MSNOW   
   Dec. 30, 2025, 1:12 PM EST   
      
   Donald Trump has spent the first year of his second term whining more   
   about Joe Biden than anyone else on earth, but his handpicked Federal   
   Reserve chairman, Jerome Powell, is a close second. The president has   
   pressed the Fed chair to lower interest rates with heavy-handed   
   tactics, and the more Powell ignored him, the greater the fury from the   
   Oval Office.   
      
   Indeed, the president has resorted to juvenile taunts and name-calling,   
   publicly condemning Powell as, among many other things, a "moron" for   
   failing to follow the White House's misguided demands.   
      
   But Trump apparently still has another tactic in mind that he hasn't   
   yet pursued. The Washington Post reported:   
      
       President Donald Trump on Monday said he might sue Federal Reserve   
   Chair Jerome H. Powell for what the president called 'gross   
   incompetence,' injecting new tension into the already strained   
   relationship between the White House and the independent central bank.   
      
   During a Mar-a-Lago press conference, standing alongside Israeli Prime   
   Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, Trump peddled familiar complaints, before   
   concluding: "It's gross incompetence against Powell. We're going to   
   probably bring a lawsuit against him."   
      
   As part of the same exchange, the Republican said he hadn't ruled out   
   trying to fire the Fed chair he personally chose for the job,   
   overlooking the inconvenient fact that he doesn't have the authority to   
   do so, and he publicly vowed not to after markets fell in response to   
   related rhetoric in April.   
      
   But putting that aside, it's important to emphasize that the White   
   House, as part of an apparent intimidation campaign, has been making   
   related threats for months. In August, Trump wrote online that he was   
   "considering allowing a major lawsuit against Powell to proceed," and   
   press secretary Karoline Leavitt insisted he was serious about this.   
      
   Like many of the president's other threats, nothing came of this. And   
   though Trump apparently hasn't given up on the idea, it's unlikely that   
   he'll follow through.   
      
   What's more, there's no reason to assume that such a civil suit would   
   even be possible. "It wasn't clear what specific claims Trump was   
   referring to Monday, or how or when a suit could be brought," the   
   Post's report added.   
      
   But I'm also curious about the implications of such an effort. If   
   litigants can file civil suits against government officials over   
   perceived "gross incompetence," wouldn't that lead to an avalanche of   
   such cases?   
      
   Given Team Trump's brazen and routine incompetence, it isn't difficult   
   to imagine the president and administration officials facing a whole   
   lot of lawsuits along these lines if he were to open such a door.   
      
   --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05   
    * Origin: you cannot sedate... all the things you hate (1:229/2)