The Racist Attack on Lisa Cook And Black Women in Power

Let's be clear: Lisa Cook is not just some line on an org chart. She is the first Black woman to serve as a Federal Reserve governor in the institution's 111-year history. A world-class economist, a public servant, and a symbol of what it looks like when Black women step into rooms that were explicitly built to exclude us. That is precisely why she is being targeted.

And it's why this case is bigger than one seat on the Board of Governors. It's a referendum on whether Black women are allowed to occupy independent, nonpartisan economic institutions without being hauled into ideological court every time a president wants a political scalp.

Due Process for Whom?

Under the Federal Reserve Act, a president can't just wake up and decide to fire a Fed governor because he's angry about interest rates or doesn't like their policy views. The law says governors can only be removed "for cause"—for serious misconduct like inefficiency, neglect of duty, or malfeasance in office. That safeguard exists to protect the independence of the Fed from the political whims of whoever happens to hold the White House.

"Black women are constantly told that if we get the degrees, follow the rules, stay twice as good and work three times as hard, we'll be safe. Lisa Cook did all of that. And when she got to one of the most powerful economic institutions in the world, they tried to toss her out like a political appointee at the Department of Agriculture."

The Fed Is Supposed to Be Above Politics

The Supreme Court has repeatedly emphasized that the central bank is structured to be insulated from partisan interference—because once the Fed becomes an arm of the incumbent's campaign strategy, the entire global financial system is at risk.

That's not how the rule of law works. That's how authoritarianism works.

Racism in a Business Suit

Let's talk about the racism here, because we're not going to hide behind euphemisms like "norm-breaking" or "institutional strain."

Chief Justice John Roberts and Justice Sonia Sotomayor both pointed out the obvious: paperwork errors happen, especially in complex real estate transactions. They do not, by themselves, prove a devious scheme. But for Black women, especially those who wield power, the threshold for suspicion is always lower and the appetite for humiliation is always higher.

The allegations against Lisa Cook, Leticia James, and Fani Willis, didn't materialize out of nowhere. They were "dug up," weaponized by political loyalists eager to target enemies of the president. The fact that those supposed smoking guns have not produced criminal charges hasn't slowed down the smear machine—because the goal was never justice. The goal was removal.

Bernice King, Spelman Sister, and the Legacy of Showing Up

And then there's the timing. This hearing took place just two days after Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.'s national holiday—two days after the country claims to honor a man who died fighting for economic justice and against the exact weaponization of state power we are watching now.

It matters that this show of solidarity came from Spelman, a historically Black women's college that has been molding Black women leaders for generations. The same pipeline that produced Lisa Cook's brilliance produced the sisterhood standing beside her.

"When Black women move through this country's halls of power, we do it knowing that any one of us can be singled out and attacked. So we form something stronger than their institutions: we form community. We ride the trains, we sit in the back rows of hearings, we send group texts, we raise money, we pray. We show up."

This Isn't Just About Lisa Cook—It's About All of Us

If this president can fire Lisa Cook on the basis of unproven, politically convenient allegations—and if the courts bless that move—then every Black woman in public service just got a warning: your job depends not on the law, not on your performance, not on your integrity, but on whether you are willing to bow.

And we know who they will reach for first when they want to make an example: us. The Black women who refuse to shrink, who refuse to be silent, who insist that economic justice is not optional, not negotiable, not a side dish to "real" policy.

We Refuse to Be Quiet While They Rewrite the Rules

So yes, I'm angry. I am angry that a president would treat the Federal Reserve—the Fed—like just another target for political revenge. I am angry that a Solicitor General would stand before the Supreme Court and casually argue that due process and judicial review are luxuries, not rights.

I am furious that once again, a Black woman has been forced to fight not just to do her job, but to keep it, while European American men in suits argue about whether the law should apply to their boss at all.

But anger is not where we end.

We end with accountability. With clarity. With a refusal to prettify what is happening: this is a racist, anti-democratic attempt to bend an independent economic institution to presidential will by making an example out of a Black woman who did nothing to deserve this but serve with excellence and integrity.