(UPDATE, 11/28, 9am: Judge Kelly ordered a further hearing on the Emergency TRO request and set it for 4pm today. Further, he accepted the Amici brief filed by Democratic Members of Congress (lead by Minority Leaders Pelosi and Schumer. READ DOJ's Opposition to TRO and Dems' Amici brief below.)
U.S. District Court Judge Timothy Kelly has conducted a hearing on the battle of CFPB's dueling Acting Directors. Meanwhile, House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi, Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, and 24 other current and former Members of Congress have asked the Court to listen to their perspective on the dispute. The Trump-nominated judge will consider the Sunday request for a Temporary Restraining Order (TRO) filed by Leandra English.
English was named as Deputy Director of the Consumer Financial Bureau's outgoing Director, Richard Cordray. Hours after that naming, President Donald Trump announced that his Director of the Office of Management and Budget, Mick Mulvaney, would become the CFPB's Interim Director.
English filed her lawsuit Sunday, along with an Emergency Motion for a Temporary Restraining Order against both President Trump and Mulvaney. The Motion asks that Mulvaney be prevented from serving as Acting Director becaause "it would severely undermine Congress’s goal of insulating the CFPB Director from presidential influence or control by requiring that it be established as an “independent bureau.” It also asks that the President be restrained from appointing any Acting Director. (He can nominate a permanent replacement who must be approved by the Senate.)
Just before 5pm (ET), the Constitutional Accountability Center filed the Motion for permission to file an Amici Curiae brief on behalf of Pelosi, Schumer and Co. (Motion published below.)
(The Plaintiff's Ermergency Motion for a Temporary Restraining Order is also reproduced below.)
Both English and Mulvaney both reported to work this morning and sent out emails to Bureau employees signed as "Acting Director". Mulvaney's email instructed employees to "please disregard any instructions you receive from Ms. English".
Judge Kelly was confirmed less than three months ago by a Senate vote of 94-2. Prior to the nomination to the lifetime appointment to the federal bench, he was Chief counsel for national security and senior crime counsel to U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Charles E. Grassley (R-IA).
The disagreement as to whether the President or the CFPB Director can appoint the Acting Director involves two different sets of U.S. Code sections - the portions of the Dodd-Frank Act that created the CFPB in 2010, and the Federal Vacancies Reform Act of 1998.
English is represented by Washington attorney Deepak Gupta (of Gupta Wessler PLLC) and the Justice Department has registered the appearance of Matthew Joseph Burns.
(This article provided by Phoenix election law attorney Paul Weich.)
CFPB - Texas & Co.'s Motion for Amici by arizonaspolitics on Scribd
CFPB - Amici Brief (Schumer/Pelosi/+24 by arizonaspolitics on Scribd
CFPB - DOJ's Opposition to TRO by arizonaspolitics on Scribd
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