The Supreme Court is considering a dangerous emergency petition from President Donald Trump. If the justices adopt any part of his argument — that presidents should be able to override legislation establishing independent agencies like the Federal Reserve and remove their leaders without notice or cause — the court could immediately destabilize markets and permanently harm the US economy. Something as seemingly minor as a stay pending appeal, the relief the president seeks, could seriously damage Fed independence.

The case at hand does not involve the Fed directly. It follows Trump’s attempt to fire, without reason, the leaders of two other independent agencies, the National Labor Relations Board and the Merit Systems Protection Board. But the president’s reasoning — laid out in his application to the court — would enable him to remove Fed Chair Jerome Powell or any other member of the Fed’s governing board at any time. The threat goes beyond mere speculation. President Trump wrote in a post on the Truth Social platform on Thursday that “Powell’s termination cannot come fast enough!”