Donald Trump declared he “should be listened to” by the Federal Reserve, as he weighs candidates to lead the central bank amid an extraordinary campaign by the White House to exert greater control over its decisions.
The US president said on Friday that former Fed governor Kevin Warsh is currently top of his list to chair the central bank.
Jerome Powell, the current Fed chairperson, is scheduled to finish an eight-year stint in the role next May. He has repeatedly defied Trump’s demands for drastic cuts to interest rates, prompting the president to launch a string of public attacks.
Trump is also considering his adviser Kevin Hassett, who leads the National Economic Council, as a potential chair of the Fed.
“I think you have Kevin and Kevin. They’re both – I think the two Kevins are great,” the president told the Wall Street Journal on Friday. “I think there are a couple of other people that are great.”
He is expected to soon nominate a candidate to lead the Fed, having lambasted the central bank’s policymakers for their cautious approach to cutting rates since return to office in January – and has even tried to fire a member of the central bank’s rate-setting policy committee.
Warsh “thinks you have to lower interest rates,” Trump claimed in the interview, in line with the views he has expressed himself for months. “And so does everybody else that I’ve talked to.”
Trump argued that the next Fed chair should listen to him on the future direction of rates. “Typically, that’s not done anymore,” he acknowledged to the Wall Street Journal. “It should be done.”
“It doesn’t mean – I don’t think he should do exactly what we say,” Trump added. “But certainly we’re – I’m a smart voice and should be listened to.”
Earlier this week, the Fed cut rates by a quarter point for the third time this year. But policymakers signaled their reluctance to cut more than once next year, amid heightened uncertainty around the direction of the economy.
In a press conference on Wednesday, Powell said the Fed was trying to balance “significant downside risks” in the jobs market with inflationary pressures from Trump’s tariffs that are “pretty clear to see”.
