When the Supreme Court decided last week to keep the controversial Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) funded, some were surprised that Justice Clarence Thomas split from some of his conservative colleagues, writing the majority opinion to keep the CFPB intact. 

In a 7-2 decision, the court held that Congress uniquely authorized the bureau to draw its funding directly from the Federal Reserve System, therefore allowing it to bypass the usual funding mechanisms laid out in the appropriations clause of the Constitution. 

The financial watchdog agency bypasses typical congressional appropriations and simply requires the CFPB director to make requests of the Treasury Department for funds as needed. The banking industry parties challenging the CFPB say that is unconstitutional, citing the appropriations clause.

But the high court’s majority disagreed. ‘In this case, we must decide the narrow question whether this funding mechanism complies with the Appropriations Clause. We hold that it does,’ the opinion states. 

‘For most federal agencies, Congress provides funding on an annual basis. This annual process forces them to regularly implore Congress to fund their operations for the next year. The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau is different. The Bureau does not have to petition for funds each year. Instead, Congress authorized the Bureau to draw from the Federal Reserve System the amount its Director deems ‘reasonably necessary to carry out’ the Bureau’s duties, subject only to an inflation-adjusted cap,’ Thomas explained. 

‘Although there may be other constitutional checks on Congress’ authority to create and fund an administrative agency, specifying the source and purpose is all the control the Appropriations Clause requires.’

‘The statute that authorizes the Bureau to draw money from the combined earnings of the Federal Reserve System to carry out its duties satisfies the Appropriations Clause,’ the opinion states. 

The banking associations, which sued the CFPB, Thomas writes ‘offer no defensible argument that the Appropriations Clause requires more than a law that authorizes the disbursement of specified funds for identified purposes.’

But Justices Samuel Alito and Neil Gorsuch strongly dissented, saying, ‘The Court upholds a novel statutory scheme under which the powerful [CFPB] may bankroll its own agenda without any congressional control or oversight.’

Thomas, in the majority opinion, fired back, ‘The dissent accepts that the question in this case is ultimately about the meaning of ‘Appropriations.’’

‘It faults us for consulting dictionaries to ascertain the original public meaning of that word, insisting instead that ‘Appropriations’ is a ‘term of art whose meaning has been fleshed out by centuries of history,” Thomas writes. 

‘But, as we have explained at length, both preratifcation and postratifcation appropriations practice support our source-and-purpose understanding,’ he said.

The CFPB has been a thorn in the side of Republicans since Sen. Elizabeth Warren, D-Mass., helped create it after the 2008 market crash in an effort to protect consumers from financial schemes, with authority to regulate banking and lending agencies via federal rules. 

President Barack Obama said in 2011 that the agency ‘was Elizabeth’s idea, and through sheer force of will, intelligence, and a bottomless well of energy, she has made, and will continue to make, a profound and positive difference for our country.’

Former acting CFPB Director Mick Mulvaney during the Trump administration even called the agency ‘Elizabeth Warren’s baby.’

Warren has been critical of the high court since Trump flipped the ideological majority with his appointments of Justices Amy Coney Barrett, Brett Kavanaugh and Gorsuch. In 2021, she called to expand the court, saying that the current court ‘threatens the democratic foundations of our nation.’

She’s been directly critical of Thomas, accusing him last year of ‘corruption’ by taking vacations paid for by a GOP mega-donor but not disclosing them. Thomas said he consulted his colleagues and the judicial conference and said he’s followed the ethics rules regarding the reporting of those trips. 

Fox News Digital reached out to Warren for comment.

When the high court ruled in the CFPB’s favor last week, she praised it, saying it ‘followed the law.’ 

Peggy Little, a senior counsel with the New Civil Liberties Alliance (NCLA) disagreed with the majority’s decision. But she thinks Thomas’ authorship ‘debunks the idea that all conservatives decide the cases the same way.’ 

‘I think it’s a healthy corrective to how the media talks about the court,’ she told Fox News Digital. 

She added that ‘it would be a mistake for Congress to consider [the decision] a license to set up similar regimes’ and that the high court ‘might revisit it and see the error of its ways.’

David B. Rivkin Jr., an appellate and constitutional law attorney and former White House and Justice Department counsel, says Thomas ‘marches to the beat of his own drum.’

‘The notion that the six conservative justices march in lockstep is absurd,’ Rivkin said. ‘There are distinctive differences not only in how they decide specific cases but in their judicial philosophy. There are numerous permutations of originalism and textualism.’

‘Justice Thomas does what he thinks is right, follows the text and its original intent when it was written, and doesn’t mind if he’s the only dissenting justice,’ John Shu, a constitutional lawyer who worked for both Bush administrations, told Fox News Digital. 

Shu co-authored the first white paper criticizing the leadership structure and funding mechanism of the CFPB with former White House counsel Ambassador C. Boyden Gray in 2010.

‘If other justices decide to agree with him, that’s nice, though he’s willing to go it alone,’ Shu observed.  ‘Justice Thomas is a true originalist and textualist, as is Justice Alito, and in this case, they interpret the term ‘appropriations’ in different ways, which further proves that the justices do not vote in lockstep as some erroneously claim.’

‘Neither Justice Alito nor Justice Thomas are results-oriented, meaning that they do not begin with a preferred outcome in mind and try to come up with some kind of justification later,’ Shu explained. 

‘Instead, they go where the law’s text and original intent take them, and they don’t concern themselves with political outcomes or backlashes, which is one of the reasons why the Constitution gives federal judges lifetime appointment, to insulate their jobs from political whims,’ he said.

Former President Bill Clinton and former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton will host an exclusive fundraising dinner for President Biden in Virginia next month.

The June 18 event is being hosted by former Virginia Gov. Terry McAuliffe, and will come just days after another fundraiser in Los Angeles that will feature President Barack Obama in addition to Biden and Clinton. That event is being hosted by actor George Clooney.

The multi-president fundraising strategy has proven successful in the past, with Biden outraising former President Trump in the 2024 cycle, according to Open Secrets. A similar program in New York raked in $26 million in a single night in New York.

Biden is facing pressure to maintain that lead, however, as Trump’s campaign received $76 million in donations in April, compared to the Biden campaign’s $51 million.

The fundraising totals were a switch from March, when Biden and the DNC brought in roughly $90 million compared to $65.6 million for Trump and the RNC. Biden is still beating Trump when it comes to cash on hand, with his campaign and related committees sitting on $192 million.

Biden had regularly been outpacing Trump in monthly fundraising, but Trump’s April haul was boosted by a record-setting $50.5 million that the former president’s campaign raked in at a single event early in the month with top dollar GOP donors at the Palm Beach, Florida, home of billionaire investor John Paulson.

The Biden campaign has spotlighted its small dollar donations, saying ‘a majority of April’s raise came from grassroots donors, and one million more supporters were added to our email list in the month alone.’

They also took aim at Trump, arguing that his campaign ‘has focused nearly entirely on courting billionaire donors, maxing out early in the cycle instead of building a durable grassroots fundraising program.’

In their announcement earlier this month, Trump campaign senior advisers Chris LaCivita and Susie Wiles pointed to their grassroots fundraising prowess, saying that ‘with half of funds raised coming from small dollar donors, it is clear that our base is energized.’

And they pledged that ‘we are raising the resources necessary to deliver a victory in November.’

Standing across from Taiwan’s newly elected president on Monday, House Foreign Affairs Chairman Michael McCaul, R-Texas, drew a stark parallel between China’s hostility toward the island and the tension that wracked the globe during World War II.

‘All democracies must stand together against aggression and tyranny, whether it’s [Vladimir Putin] and Russia, the ayatollah of Iran, or Chairman Xi next door to us in China – an unholy alliance is eroding peace around the world,’ McCaul said. ‘Not since World War II, my father’s war, have we seen such blatant violence and naked aggression.’

The Texas Republican is leading a multi-day diplomatic trip to Taipei with a bipartisan coalition of House lawmakers. The group met with Taiwanese President Lai Ching-tse and Foreign Minister Jaushieh Joseph Wu on their first full day – the first U.S. delegation to meet with the new officials since they took office a little over a week ago.

‘I gave them some updates on the weapons and some other things we’re doing to help them, but they just wanted me to know that the threat was getting very intense from Chairman Xi,’ McCaul told Fox News Digital after the meetings.

Rep. Young Kim, R-Calif., chair of the Foreign Affairs panel’s Indo-Pacific subcommittee, told Fox News Digital, ‘I thought both meetings went very productively today, we had frank conversations.’

‘In all of our conversations, one thing was made very clear. Nobody wants conflict in the Taiwan Strait,’ Kim said. ‘Our goal is not to think about an invasion or a potential conflict, our goal is to ensure there is that deterrence by providing Taiwan what they need to protect themselves and defend themselves.’

The delegation is also made up of House Taiwan Caucus co-chair Rep. Andy Barr, R-Ky., as well as Reps. Joe Wilson, R-S.C., Jimmy Panetta, D-Calif., and Chrissy Houlahan, D-Pa.

Both the Taiwanese and U.S. leaders made clear that China’s aggression in the Indo-Pacific is creating an increasingly dire situation.

It comes days after China encircled the island with dozens of warships and military planes as ‘punishment’ for Lai’s advocacy for a free and independent Taiwan, according to Beijing’s Defense Ministry.

During his remarks to media after the lawmakers’ meeting with Lai, Foreign Minister Wu darkly joked that China had ‘welcomed’ the U.S. delegation with its military drills.

McCaul called it an ‘intimidation tactic to punish democracy.’

‘They don’t like democracy. I know Chairman Xi would often tell [Former Taiwanese President Tsai] that… democracy doesn’t work. Democracy is dysfunctional, democracy is broken,’ he said during the press conference. ‘In his government, there is no freedom. There is no democracy. And the people have no power whatsoever.’

Referencing China launching military drills around the same time as his trip to Taiwan last year, McCaul quipped, ‘I’m starting to think it’s me they don’t like.’

Wu said of the lawmakers’ visit, ‘In this critical time, it’s a powerful gesture. It’s a powerful display of the strong bipartisan support for Taiwan by the United States.’

During his earlier remarks at the presidential office, Lai referenced former U.S. President Reagan’s foreign policy of peace through strength.

‘Therefore moving forward, I will enhance reform and bolster national defense, showing the world the Taiwanese People’s determination to defend their homeland,’ Lai said.

The camaraderie between the U.S. lawmakers and Taiwanese officials was palpable during both meetings. 

In a lighthearted moment before his remarks with Lai, McCaul modeled the American-made Stetson he brought as a gift for Lai. The two men shared a hug and handshake after the conclusion of their public remarks.

He has been out of Congress for nearly half a year, but the shadow of former House Speaker Kevin McCarthy, R-Calif., is still looming large over the House of Representatives as lawmakers get ready for another intense government funding fight.

Last year, McCarthy agreed to suspend the U.S. debt limit through January 2025 in exchange for federal spending caps for the next two fiscal years, a deal he struck with President Biden called the Fiscal Responsibility Act. Under its terms, discretionary government funding can only grow by 1% in fiscal year 2025.

House appropriators are now wrestling with how to navigate that cap without severely impacting Homeland Security and Defense spending. Fiscal conservatives want negotiators to stick to the statutory cap, which is roughly $1.606 trillion. Defense hawks, meanwhile, are concerned about the effects of a meager increase and worry it could amount to a spending cut on national security when accounting for inflation.

‘That was a deal that McCarthy made, right? He’s not here anymore. But our hands might still, legally, be tied to it,’ one GOP lawmaker told Fox News Digital. 

‘I understand what the intent of the FRA was, but… the caps as written prevent us from effectively keeping pace with China. So, whatever is needed between leadership, the Senate and the president to allow us a little more maneuvering space in terms of the allocations between the federal agencies and the 12 bills, I think is necessary.’

Republican Study Committee Chairman Kevin Hern, R-Okla., conceded that ‘sure’ the caps constrained negotiators but urged them to work toward it as written.

‘Honestly, I’m having a difficult time figuring out why it’s so hard for us to establish the numbers. I mean, it was agreed to a two-year cap. You know, $1.606 trillion is the number, but it’s like everybody’s struggling to figure out what it really is,’ Hern said.

He noted that fiscal year 2024’s government funding level was ‘a little bit higher’ than the agreed-upon $1.59 trillion, thanks to ‘some sidebar deals that all of us found out about afterwards.’

‘But this cap is $1.606, and with no backroom cigar smoke-filled room deals. So we’ll see where my colleague Congressman Cole comes up with the appropriations,’ Hern said.

When asked about whether he felt constrained by the FRA, House Appropriations Committee Chairman Tom Cole, R-Okla., told Fox News Digital, ‘I mean, that’s the law, so we’re going to mark it up to what the law tells us to mark up to.’

Rep. Jake Ellzey, R-Texas, a member of the Appropriations Committee, similarly said, ‘We’re doing the best we can, it’s the law of the land. So you do what you can with what you’ve got — if frogs had wings, they’d be a lot more successful on not hitting their rear end when they jump.’

He also suggested that there would be certain hurdles brought by the FRA. ‘Based on the FRA, most of those bills are going to take a shave except for Defense and Homeland. And of course, even with the increase for those two, it’s a net decrease because of inflation, so real dollars are still getting cut no matter which spending bill you’re talking about,’ Ellzey said.

‘Chairman Cole has already made some good, hard, strategic decisions…so we’ve got some clear pictures of where we’re going, and we’re going to be far more aggressive on getting those bills done on time this year.’

Indeed, House GOP leaders are eyeing an ambitious schedule to get all 12 individual spending bills that fund the U.S. government passed well before the Sept. 30 deadline at the end of the fiscal year.

Majority Leader Steve Scalise, R-La., outlined a legislative calendar that would have them passed before Congress embarks on a monthlong August recess during a closed-door House GOP conference meeting earlier this week, a source familiar with his comments told Fox News Digital.

Last year’s government funding fight was marked by chaos and disagreements within the House GOP as members on the right of the conference pushed leaders to leverage a government shutdown in exchange for deeper spending cuts, while other Republicans sounded the alarm on the economic and political ramifications a shutdown would have.

The fight over funding the government in fiscal year 2024 was among the factors that led to McCarthy’s historic ouster last October.

Fox News Digital reached out to a representative for the former speaker for comment.