Ahead of President Donald Trump’s tense visit to the Federal Reserve’s office building where he clashed with chairman Jerome Powell, the fed chair’s biggest Democratic critic warned that Trump is looking for an excuse to fire him.
And she is not OK with that.
Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-MA), the ranking Democrat on the Senate Banking Committee, warned that Trump might remove Powell before his term expires.
“I’m worried about President Trump trying to find a pretext to fire Jerome Powell,” Warren told The Independent as the Senate finished votes for the week on Thursday.
Around that time, Trump was visiting the Marriner S. Eccles Federal Reserve Board Building. In recent weeks, Russell Vought, the director of the Office of Management and Budget, and Kevin Hassett, Trump’s chairman of the Council of Economic Advisers, have criticized Powell for running over budget for rennovations for the building.
The president cannot fire the Federal Reserve chairman, whose term expires in May, without cause. But some fear that Trump might use the renovations as that cause to fire Powell.
In a rather remarkable exchange, Trump told reporters, with Powell by his side, that the cost of the renovations was about $3.1 billion, which Powell corrected in real time.
When Powell saw the costs Trump presented, Powell said that the president had included the cost of another renovation.
“You just added in a third building,” Powell said. “It was built five years ago.”
Trump has ramped up his criticism of Powell in recent months because Powell has refused to lower interest rates, calling Powell “a stupid person.”
Powell has taken a wait-and-see approach to the effects of the global reciprocal tariffs on the larger financial market, saying that they will spike inflation and slow economic growth.
After Trump’s meeting with Powell, he reiterated his desire for Powell to lower rates after visiting.
“Our country is booming, and the interest rate is a final little notch,” he told reporters. But Trump stopped short of saying that he wanted to sack Powell.
“I would love to see it completed, I don’t want to put that in this category,” he said.
Historically, the Federal Reserve has sought to avoid politics as it seeks to fulfill its dual mandate of maintaining low employment and stable prices. Its chairman serves a four-year term that overlaps presidential administrations.
But in recent months, Trump has taken aim at Powell, even questioning who nominated him, despite the fact Trump tapped Powell in 2017 to run the central bank to replace Janet Yellen.
Warren in the past has criticized Powell, voting against his initial confirmation in 2018 and then again in 2022 when Joe Biden renominated him.
At the time, Warren called him a “dangerous man.” In the past, she criticized his lax approach to oversight of the financial system. After the collapse of Silicon Valley Bank collapsed, Warren said “Congress handed Chair Powell the flamethrower that he aimed at the banking rules.”
But Warren has defended Powell in the name of independence of the central bank, which for more than a century has been a central tenet of the Federal Reserve.
“I strongly believe in transparency and better oversight for the Fed, but Donald Trump has been beating the drum for months to try to fire Jerome Powell, which he cannot legally do,” she told The Independent in an interview last week. “No one is fooled into thinking that Trump and his henchmen are suddenly really interested in the cost of plumbing and painting for a 90-year-old building.”
Warren also said that she wants to see lower interest rates as well, but blamed Trump’s tariffs for interest rates remaining high.
“I’ve pushed for a long time for the Fed to reduce interest rates,” Warren said. “But Fed Chair Powell, said last month he would have reduced interest rates back in February. except for the chaos that Donald Trump is causing.”
Earlier this month, Powell said that the Federal Reserve would have cut interest rates if not for Trump’s reciprocal tariffs.
“There is one person who is responsible for those high interest rates and his name is Donald Trump,” Warren said.
