January 21, 2026 — Morning Report

Zherka v. Bondi (22-1108) was listed in the episode registry but does not appear in any accessible Jan 21, 2026 transcript. All four 012126 transcript JSON files are empty (zero-length). Coverage cannot be confirmed. The episode's 2A segment covered the Jurka v. Bondi cert denial (non-violent felon, weapons permit denied under NY law), and the same batch included cert denials in U.S. v. Perry and U.S. v. Green. Zherka may have been mentioned alongside these as a batch cert denial, but no text exists to confirm.

U.S. v. Jefferson (25-cr-00160) was listed in the episode registry but does not appear in any accessible Jan 21, 2026 transcript. All four 012126 transcript JSON files are empty (zero-length). Coverage cannot be confirmed without video re-watch.

Dr. Lisa Cook, a member of the Federal Reserve Board of Governors, was removed by President Trump. A district court ordered her reinstated pending litigation; the Trump administration appealed that stay, arguing: (1) the district court lacked jurisdiction to reinstate her; (2) Cook has no due process right to appeal her firing because Congress never created one for Fed board members; and (3) the firing was for cause — mortgage fraud allegations. Cook argued that since Marbury v. Madison (1803), officers with for-cause tenure have had a legal right to their office, and courts since 1798 have allowed officers to remain while challenging unlawful removal. The deeper stakes: justices from across the ideological spectrum have repeatedly used the Federal Reserve as an example of an institution whose independence is sacrosanct — an implicit limit on presidential removal power. With Trump also threatening criminal charges against Fed Chair Jerome Powell, the Court found itself facing the worst-case scenario it had always hypothesized.