\n<\/p>\n
The US Department of Justice is dropping its criminal investigation against the Federal Reserve chair, Jerome Powell, clearing the path for Donald Trump\u2019s new nominee for chair to be confirmed.<\/p>\n
Jeanine Pirro, Trump\u2019s appointed US attorney for the District of Columbia, said in a social media post that she had directed her office to close its investigation into renovations at the Fed headquarters that went over budget.<\/p>\n
\u201cI have directed my office to close our investigation as the [inspector general\u2019s office] undertakes this inquiry,\u201d Pirro wrote. \u201cNote well, however, that I will not hesitate to restart a criminal investigation should the facts warrant doing so.\u201d<\/p>\n
The investigation was first made public in January after Powell released a video announcing he had been subpoenaed by the justice department. In rare, pointed remarks about the White House, Powell said the investigation was not actually about the Fed\u2019s renovation but was a pretext meant to pressure the central bank to lower interest rates.<\/p>\n
\u201cThis is about whether the Fed will be able to continue to set interest rates based on evidence and economic conditions \u2013 or whether instead monetary policy will be directed by political pressure or intimidation,\u201d Powell said at the time.<\/p>\n
The White House received bipartisan criticism over the investigation, including from Thom Tillis, the Republican senator who said he would block the nomination of Kevin Warsh, Trump\u2019s pick to replace Powell, until the justice department ends its investigation.<\/p>\n
\u201cLet\u2019s get rid of the investigation so I can support your nomination,\u201d Tillis told Warsh during his Senate hearing on Tuesday.<\/p>\n
Trump has been at loggerheads with Powell over interest rate policy \u2013 branding the Fed chair a \u201cmoron\u201d for voting against rate cuts.<\/p>\n
Despite the growing pressure to end the investigation, Trump last week doubled down on the search, saying that \u201cwhether it\u2019s incompetence, corruption or both, I think you have to find out\u201d.<\/p>\n
But Republicans needed Tillis\u2019s tie-breaking vote to get Warsh through the Senate\u2019s banking committee. Powell\u2019s term will end on 15 May.<\/p>\n
A former investment banker and Fed governor, Warsh in his hearing made clear that he is aligned with Trump on wanting lower interest rates, drawing concerns from Democrats over whether he would be able to keep the central bank independent from the White House.<\/p>\n
The Democratic senator Elizabeth Warren was highly critical of Warsh at the Senate hearing. After the announcement that the Powell investigation had been dropped, she said: \u201cThis is just an attempt to clear the path for Senate Republicans to install President Trump\u2019s sock puppet Kevin Warsh as Fed Chair.\u201d<\/p>\n
Economists largely agree that a non-political, independent central bank is essential for a stable economy.<\/p>\n
Even with the end of Powell\u2019s investigation, Trump\u2019s prolonged battle with the Fed is not over yet. The supreme court still has to rule on whether Trump\u2019s firing of Lisa Cook, the Fed governor who was temporarily reinstated by a federal court, was constitutional. The court is expected to release a ruling by June.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
The US Department of Justice is dropping its criminal investigation against the Federal Reserve chair, Jerome Powell, clearing the path for Donald Trump\u2019s new nominee for chair to be confirmed. Jeanine Pirro, Trump\u2019s appointed US attorney for the District of Columbia, said in a social media post that she had directed her office to close<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":48726,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[49],"tags":[4516,200,2573,319,1037,4438,2282,4439,517],"class_list":{"0":"post-48725","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-business","8":"tag-criminal","9":"tag-department","10":"tag-drops","11":"tag-federal","12":"tag-investigation","13":"tag-jerome","14":"tag-justice","15":"tag-powell","16":"tag-reserve"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/48725","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=48725"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/48725\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/48726"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=48725"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=48725"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=48725"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}