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Todd Phillips

@tphillips.bsky.social
2.8K followers 201 following 601 posts

Banking and administrative law. Independent policy consultant. Future Robinson College. Fellow Roosevelt Institute. Fmr CAP, FDIC, ACUS.

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Reposted by Todd Phillips
Todd Phillips @tphillips.bsky.social · 04/09/2026
Ben Cavataro and I have a new paper forthcoming in the Journal of Law and Politics titled "Associate Commissioners." We interviewed 24 associate members of multimember regulatory agencies to understand the *actual* power they wield in their agencies. papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers....
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Todd Phillips @tphillips.bsky.social · 04/09/2026
Ben Cavataro and I have a new paper forthcoming in the Journal of Law and Politics titled "Associate Commissioners." We interviewed 24 associate members of multimember regulatory agencies to understand the *actual* power they wield in their agencies. papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers....
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Todd Phillips @tphillips.bsky.social · 26/08/2026
I say this as a former Roosevelt Institute fellow: This is a bad take. We all know that NBFIs will fail, and the Fed's only legal authority is to bail them out. We need Congress to legislate before there is a crisis, addressing the moral hazard that comes from the Fed's unilateral action.
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Todd Phillips @tphillips.bsky.social · 01/08/2026
Does anyone know what the polling on immigration/ICE looks like for Maine likely voters?
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Todd Phillips @tphillips.bsky.social · 31/07/2026
The US has apparently decided to not enforce AML/sanctions rules against banks doing business with Venezuela. This means that, although Venezuela is still sanctioned, anyone who was previously unable to get ill-gotten funds out of the country can now do so. www.fdic.gov/news/press-r...
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Todd Phillips @tphillips.bsky.social · 27/07/2026
As the Election Assistance Comm'n currently shows, presidential removal can prevent agencies from functioning by ensuring there is no one with power to execute the law. Nick and I argue that the Take Care Clause will not support such a conclusion, and encourage courts to enjoin such removals.
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Reposted by Todd Phillips
Nick Bednar @nicholasbednar.bsky.social · 27/07/2026
Over at @ssrn.bsky.social, @tphillips.bsky.social and I have a new essay called "A Faithful Execution Exception to Slaughter," examining whether courts should enjoin removals when they break quorums in multimember commissions. papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers....
papers.ssrn.com
A Faithful Execution Exception to Slaughter
In Trump v. Slaughter, the Supreme Court held that Article II permits a President to remove principal officers at will. Ostensibly, the removal power allows the
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Todd Phillips @tphillips.bsky.social · 27/07/2026
From @punchbowlnews.bsky.social: 50+ academics from across the ideological spectrum signed a letter urging Congress to restore agency independence following Trump v. Slaughter. punchbowl.news/open-letter-...
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Reposted by Todd Phillips
The Bulwark @thebulwark.com · 13/07/2026
The Supreme Court greatly weakened independent agencies, but the president's power to fire their officials is not exactly the trump card it looks like. @tphillips.bsky.social on how Congress can slow the politicization of independent agencies:
lnk.thebulwark.com
The Supreme Court Broke Independent Agencies. Here’s a Way to Slow the Damage.
A crypto bill before Congress offers a chance to keep presidents from turning independent commissions into one-party instruments.
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Reposted by Todd Phillips
Todd Phillips @tphillips.bsky.social · 12/07/2026
I'm up in @thebulwark.com this morning with a piece (1) arguing that quorum requirements are an opportunity to push back against the Supreme Court's decision in Slaughter and (2) encouraging Senators to demand their inclusion in the forthcoming crypto bill. www.thebulwark.com/p/supreme-co...
thebulwark.com
The Supreme Court Broke Independent Agencies. Here’s a Way to Slow the Damage.
A crypto bill before Congress offers a chance to keep presidents from turning independent commissions into one-party instruments.
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Todd Phillips @tphillips.bsky.social · 12/07/2026
I'm up in @thebulwark.com this morning with a piece (1) arguing that quorum requirements are an opportunity to push back against the Supreme Court's decision in Slaughter and (2) encouraging Senators to demand their inclusion in the forthcoming crypto bill. www.thebulwark.com/p/supreme-co...
thebulwark.com
The Supreme Court Broke Independent Agencies. Here’s a Way to Slow the Damage.
A crypto bill before Congress offers a chance to keep presidents from turning independent commissions into one-party instruments.
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Todd Phillips @tphillips.bsky.social · 10/07/2026
In this Lawfare post, Nick and I argue that the Take Care Clause should be read as prohibiting the president from stopping the law from being executed.
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Reposted by Todd Phillips
Nick Bednar @nicholasbednar.bsky.social · 10/07/2026
Over at @lawfaremedia.org, @tphillips.bsky.social and I discuss the relationship between the removal power and the President's obligation to take care that the laws be faithfully executed in the context of the recent firings at the EAC. www.lawfaremedia.org/article/fait...
lawfaremedia.org
Faithful Execution and the Removal Power
President Trump is exercising his removal power in ways that defeat his duty to faithfully execute the law.
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Reposted by Todd Phillips
Nick Bednar @nicholasbednar.bsky.social · 10/07/2026
@tphillips.bsky.social and I recently wrote about this issue. We also drafted an amicus brief that touched on it in Slaughter. As far as we are concerned, Slaughter did not resolve the conflict between the Take Care Clause and the removal power. We'll post an update on @lawfaremedia.org shortly.
The removal power derives, in part, from the President’s obligation to “take
Care that the Laws be faithfully executed.”434 The removal power poses less of a
risk to the faithful execution of law in single-headed agencies since the
Vacancies Act ensures that an acting official remains capable of exercising the
agency’s authority. The loss of a quorum within a commission, however,
prevents it from executing the law, effectively undermining Congress’s intent
that enacted legislation be given effect. Given the derivation of the removal
power from the Take Care Clause, courts should prohibit any use of the removal
power that would prevent the laws from being executed.
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Todd Phillips @tphillips.bsky.social · 10/07/2026
The Democrats should challenge their removal on the grounds that preventing an agency from functioning is not taking care that the law is faithfully executed.
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Reposted by Todd Phillips
Dan Walters @profdanwalters.bsky.social · 07/07/2026
I really do think that there needs to be a movement--every bit as sustained and well-organized as the movement leading to Slaughter--to invigorate the positive requirements of the Take Care Clause of Article II. It's sitting there in plain sight and it means what it says.
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Todd Phillips @tphillips.bsky.social · 02/07/2026
I'd love to know how the FTC thinks large language models are created.
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Todd Phillips @tphillips.bsky.social · 29/06/2026
Hey @kexelchabot.bsky.social, this seems like an ahistoric reading of these laws, right? The president couldn't fire the CJ or VP, but could remove them from their positions on the sinking fund commission? What?
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Todd Phillips @tphillips.bsky.social · 29/06/2026
With the Slaughter opinion today, we need to figure out whether we still believe in agency independence. Here's my argument from last year that independence is a progressive value in itself, and a call to scholars and policymakers about how to defend it: democracyjournal.org/arguments/am...
democracyjournal.org
America Needs Independent Regulators
A future Democratic President will be tempted to use power like Trump. That would be a mistake.
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Todd Phillips @tphillips.bsky.social · 29/06/2026
There are two ways to read this: The civil service is gone, or Slaughter is just a sloppy opinion by a Supreme Court on a mission.
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Todd Phillips @tphillips.bsky.social · 29/06/2026
The Cook and Slaughter opinions, released together, show just how political the Supreme Court is. As Kavanaugh's concurrence in Cook makes clear, the Court treats the Federal Reserve as special for no reason other than its own policy preference.
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Todd Phillips @tphillips.bsky.social · 29/06/2026
Ugh. Just awful and ahistorical.
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Todd Phillips @tphillips.bsky.social · 25/06/2026
If you'd like to learn about how a stablecoin issuer's choice of charter affects how it'll be treated in insolvency, I have a blog post on the topic. www.klaros.com/post/insolve...
klaros.com
Insolvency for Payment Stablecoin Issuers
This is the first in a series of blog posts investigating the GENIUS Act’s insolvency provisions and offering considerations for those interested in issuing payment stablecoins.By Doug Landy & Todd Ph...
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Todd Phillips @tphillips.bsky.social · 24/06/2026
@robinwigglesworth.ft.com I love this caption. Well done.
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Todd Phillips @tphillips.bsky.social · 04/06/2026
I spoke with the AP about how crazy it is that George Santos may have engaged in insider trading / market manipulation on contracts about himself on Kalshi. Contracts about whether someone will attend the SOTU are straight-up gambling. apnews.com/article/geor...
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Todd Phillips @tphillips.bsky.social · 01/06/2026
Very pleased to see this article in print! Here's hoping its arguments will be adopted by courts!
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Todd Phillips @tphillips.bsky.social · 29/05/2026
Hey professors who advise on student notes, here's a topic idea: Before the 20th century, what were the laws applicable to redeeming bank notes, and is there applicability to stablecoins today? My sense is that anyone could redeem notes, but that's not the case for stablecoins.
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Todd Phillips @tphillips.bsky.social · 14/05/2026
I was on @mprnews.org talking about--what else--prediction markets. Minnesota's legislature passed an anti-PM bill that the governor is likely to soon sign. What will happen then? Lawsuits. www.mprnews.org/episode/2026...
mprnews.org
Passage of Minnesota prediction market ban sets stage for likely lawsuits
Minnesota lawmakers Tuesday passed a bill banning prediction markets from the state. If it’s signed into law, it will likely face legal challenges, as courts around the country weigh what counts as ga...
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Reposted by Todd Phillips
Nick Bednar @nicholasbednar.bsky.social · 13/05/2026
Oh boy! Do @tphillips.bsky.social and I have an article for everyone about the recent mischievousness surrounding quorums. papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers....
papers.ssrn.com
Commission Quorums
Multimember commissions are a central feature of the modern administrative state. Yet a growing number have lost their legal authority to function—not through s
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Todd Phillips @tphillips.bsky.social · 11/05/2026
How does the crypto industry expect they'll be able to get Democratic votes in the Senate for CLARITY if they're proposing that they can list contracts that are susceptible to manipulation?! Link: www.politico.com/news/2026/05...
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Todd Phillips @tphillips.bsky.social · 28/04/2026
What I find fascinating about this is that the weirdness is (largely) limited to JUST the first page. The rest (largely) reads like a normal brief. It seems like the first page was gussied-up for public consuption.
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Todd Phillips @tphillips.bsky.social · 26/04/2026
I see two big lingering questions: 1) Will Jerome Powell stay on the Board after Warsh is confirmed? 2) If Powell stays on, do the other governors treat him as the de facto chair of the Board and FOMC (or even vote him as de jure chair of the FOMC)?
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Todd Phillips @tphillips.bsky.social · 23/04/2026
As I told @politico.com, Kevin Warsh's view that Fed governors are independent for monetary policy but not bank regulation doesn't work. www.politico.com/newsletters/...
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Todd Phillips @tphillips.bsky.social · 01/04/2026
I spoke with @clairewilliams.bsky.social re stablecoin yield. "Much of this has been Coinbase saying we want to do activity-based whatever, and the banking industry saying we're fine with that, except for staking and Coinbase saying, no, that's an activity." www.americanbanker.com/news/crypto-...
americanbanker.com
Crypto needs the yield compromise more than banks do
The stalemate over stablecoin yield leaves both sides uneasy, but ultimately favor banks.
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Todd Phillips @tphillips.bsky.social · 26/03/2026
Can any of my followers who do consumer work opine on whether debanking really is likely to be a violation of the FTC Act? It's not unlawful under the federal banking laws. www.ftc.gov/news-events/...
ftc.gov
FTC Chairman Andrew N. Ferguson Issues Warning Letters to CEOs of PayPal, Stripe, Visa and Mastercard About Debanking American Consumers
Federal Trade Commission Chairman Andrew N.
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Todd Phillips @tphillips.bsky.social · 12/03/2026
I spoke with the @apnews.com about what's at stake in #PredictionMarkets litigation: "What’s at stake here is whether states will be able to regulate gambling or if gambling is going to be subsumed into finance and ultimately regulated by Congress.” apnews.com/article/utah...
apnews.com
Utah’s anti-gambling tradition meets Kalshi and Polymarket in a new legal fight
Utah is at the forefront of a states' rights battle between itself and prediction markets like Kalshi and Polymarket.
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Todd Phillips @tphillips.bsky.social · 02/03/2026
Pleased that my co-authored piece, Regulatory History and Judicial Review, is now out in the Minnesota Law Review! We argue that courts should allow agencies to supplement their rules' preambles with internal records to demonstrate contemporaneous rationales. minnesotalawreview.org/wp-content/u...
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Todd Phillips @tphillips.bsky.social · 17/02/2026
@nicholasbednar.bsky.social and I have an op-ed in @bloomberglaw.com encouraging litigators who suing regulatory agencies that are missing more than half of their membership (like the CFTC, FTC, and NCUA) to include quorum violations among their claims. news.bloomberglaw.com/legal-exchan...
news.bloomberglaw.com
Litigators Urged to Challenge Potentially Inquorate Agencies
For the past year, several federal multimember regulatory agencies have been operating with a fraction of their seats filled. Though a single absence doesn’t impede a commission’s ability to operate, ...
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Todd Phillips @tphillips.bsky.social · 09/02/2026
Does an enterprising class-action lawyer want to take this on, on the basis that the NCUA lacks a quorum and is legally unable to approve this extension?
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Todd Phillips @tphillips.bsky.social · 08/02/2026
New polling on crypto says what I've been saying for years: 42% to 32%, voters support strong legislation to protect consumers, stop scams, address money laundering, and ensure that crypto can't threaten the financial system. punchbowl.news/2-6-26-crypt...
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Todd Phillips @tphillips.bsky.social · 06/02/2026
Interesting amicus brief by @democracyforward.org in Trump's $10b tax lawuit. They convincingly make the claim that there is no case or controversy if the President is on both sides of the litigation. Interesting consequence of the UET. democracyforward.org/wp-content/u...
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Todd Phillips @tphillips.bsky.social · 22/01/2026
It turns out, industry doesn't really like the unitary executive theory. At the encouragement of the banking industry, the FDIC (which includes Russ Vought) just approved procedures that remove PAS officials from adjudicating cases. www.fdic.gov/board/federa...
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Todd Phillips @tphillips.bsky.social · 16/01/2026
I know most folks on Bluesky don't follow crypto, but I put this on the Other Site and figured I'd post it here for anyone who wants to understand what's going on. TL;DR: Community/regional banks and Coinbase are locked in a zero-sum competition. If one wins, the other loses.
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Todd Phillips @tphillips.bsky.social · 14/01/2026
Spot on
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Todd Phillips @tphillips.bsky.social · 06/01/2026
I'll be at AALS this week. Let me know if you want to grab coffee, a meal, or just have a casual chat!
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Todd Phillips @tphillips.bsky.social · 30/12/2025
Flagging this for colleagues who study legislation, like @beaubaumann.bsky.social. Someone should write about efforts to redefine through regulation terms that Congress thought had concrete meanings. Beau and I wrote about the term "investment contract," and I've just found another one.
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Todd Phillips @tphillips.bsky.social · 30/12/2025
Inspired by others (particularly Jeremy Kress), late yesterday I submitted a short comment letter on the OCC/FDIC NPRM on unsafe or unsound practices. A lot of it was pulled from my prior scholarship, but I learned a fascinating new thing over the course of writing it. 1/
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Reposted by Todd Phillips
Todd Phillips @tphillips.bsky.social · 22/12/2025
I just filed an amicus brief in Kalshi's lawsuit against Maryland, arguing that the sports-related contracts Kalshi lists are unlikely to be commodity derivatives, such that the CFTC does not have "exclusive jurisdiction" over them and Maryland's gaming laws are not preempted. 1/
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Reposted by Todd Phillips
Tuffy @smtuffy.bsky.social · 22/12/2025
Shout out to @tphillips.bsky.social for this one
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Todd Phillips @tphillips.bsky.social · 22/12/2025
I just filed an amicus brief in Kalshi's lawsuit against Maryland, arguing that the sports-related contracts Kalshi lists are unlikely to be commodity derivatives, such that the CFTC does not have "exclusive jurisdiction" over them and Maryland's gaming laws are not preempted. 1/
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