National Economic Council Director Kevin Hassett, one of the top contenders to replace Jerome Powell as Federal Reserve chair, downplayed any role that President Donald Trump\u2019s opinion would have in setting interest rates.<\/p>\n
That\u2019s despite Trump repeatedly insisting that he ought to have some say on monetary policy. Most recently, he said Friday his voice should be heard because \u201cI\u2019ve made a lot of money.\u201d<\/p>\n
In an interview Sunday on CBS\u2019 Face the Nation<\/em><\/a>, Hassett said Trump has \u201cvery strong and well founded views\u201d but pointed out that the Fed is independent, with the chairman tasked with driving consensus among other policymakers on the rate-setting Federal Open Market Committee.<\/p>\n \u201cBut in the end, it\u2019s a committee that votes,\u201d he added. \u201cAnd I\u2019d be happy to talk to the president every day until both of us are dead because it\u2019s so much fun to talk, even if I were Fed chair of if I wasn\u2019t Fed chair.\u201d<\/p>\n Hassett said he hopes Kevin Warsh, a former Fed governor\u00a0who is also being considered for the chairmanship, would talk to the president as well if he becomes Fed chief.<\/p>\n Trump told the Wall Street Journal<\/em><\/a> on Friday that Warsh was at the top of his list and said \u201cthe two Kevins are great.\u201d <\/p>\n The comment surprised Wall Street, which had overwhelming odds on Hassett as the favorite. On the prediction market Kalshi<\/a>, the probability that he will be nominated as Fed chair has plunged to 50% from 80.6% earlier this month, while Warsh\u2019s odds shot up to 41% from 11%.<\/p>\n Trump has said he will nominate a Fed chair in early 2026, with Powell\u2019s term due to expire in May. Until then, the contenders have time to make their case. According to the Journal<\/em>, Trump met Warsh on Wednesday at the White House and pressed him on whether he could be trusted to back rate cuts.\u00a0<\/p>\n When asked on Sunday if Trump\u2019s voice would have equal weighting to the voting members on the FOMC, Hassett replied, \u201cno, he would have no weight.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cHis opinion matters if it\u2019s good, if it\u2019s based on data,\u201d he explained. \u201cAnd then if you go to the committee and you say, \u2018well the president made this argument, and that\u2019s a really sound argument, I think. What do you think?\u2019 If they reject it, then they\u2019ll vote in a different way.\u201d<\/p>\n For his part, Hassett has regularly supported more easing and is one of Trump\u2019s fiercest economic surrogates. But since joining Trump\u2019s second administration, some of Hassett\u2019s previous colleagues have expressed alarm<\/a> over signs he\u2019s serving more as a political loyalist.<\/p>\n He has become a regular presence on cable news, defending Trump\u2019s policy priorities, downplaying unfavorable data, and echoing the White House line on everything from inflation to the legitimacy of federal statistics.<\/p>\n Meanwhile, the\u00a0Fed\u2019s early reappointment of its regional bank presidents<\/a> eased concerns the central bank would soon lose its independence as Trump continues demanding steeper rate cuts.<\/p>\n That\u2019s after the administration floated a district residency requirement for Fed presidents\u2014an idea Hassett backed\u2014raising fears it was seeking a wider leadership shake-up. <\/p>\n \u201cIf I\u2019m reading this properly, they just Trump-proofed the Fed,\u201d Justin Wolfers, a professor of public policy and economics at the University of Michigan, wrote in a\u00a0post on X<\/a> about the reappointment announcement.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n Join us at the Fortune Workplace Innovation Summit <\/strong>May 19\u201320, 2026, in Atlanta. The next era of workplace innovation is here\u2014and the old playbook is being rewritten. At this exclusive, high-energy event, the world\u2019s most innovative leaders will convene to explore how AI, humanity, and strategy converge to redefine, again, the future of work. Register now<\/a>.<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" National Economic Council Director Kevin Hassett, one of the top contenders to replace Jerome Powell as Federal Reserve chair, downplayed any role that President Donald Trump\u2019s opinion would have in setting interest rates. That\u2019s despite Trump repeatedly insisting that he ought to have some say on monetary policy. Most recently, he said Friday his voice […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":8334,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-8333","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/wpinitiate.com\/echo-test\/demo973e36f5\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8333","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/wpinitiate.com\/echo-test\/demo973e36f5\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/wpinitiate.com\/echo-test\/demo973e36f5\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wpinitiate.com\/echo-test\/demo973e36f5\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wpinitiate.com\/echo-test\/demo973e36f5\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=8333"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/wpinitiate.com\/echo-test\/demo973e36f5\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8333\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wpinitiate.com\/echo-test\/demo973e36f5\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/8334"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/wpinitiate.com\/echo-test\/demo973e36f5\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=8333"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wpinitiate.com\/echo-test\/demo973e36f5\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=8333"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wpinitiate.com\/echo-test\/demo973e36f5\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=8333"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}