The Supreme Court recently suggested that the president cannot fire head of the country’s central banking system due to its independence protections.
Fed in no rush to change rates
Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell says it is still appropriate to keep monetary policy on hold, given uncertainty about the economic outlook.
Bloomberg
The head of America’s central banking system encouraged Princeton University’s 2025 graduates to do “whatever it takes to preserve and strengthen our democracy” in a May 25 commencement speech at the Ivy League university.
Jerome Powell, the chairman of the Federal Reserve, also remarked on the importance of public service and how the country’s “great universities are the envy of the world and a crucial national asset,” in an apparent rebuke of President Donald Trump’s war on elite colleges and universities.
Powell, however, is likely shielded from Trump’s ire — which he often receives.
The Supreme Court in a May 22 ruling appeared to give Powell some protection from Trump when it weighed in on the president’s firing of two independent members of labor boards, with the justices noting that the Federal Reserve system is “uniquely structured” and part of a “distinct historical tradition” of independence. The carve-out for the Fed suggests the central bank’s leaders will enjoy stronger protections against Trump than other quasi-governmental entities.
The Fed chair, who graduated from Princeton in 1975 with a degree in political science rather than economics, joked that he picked the wrong major at the New Jersey school.
“I had brushed off my parents’ one academic suggestion, which was to major in economics, which struck me as boring and useless,” Powell said. “After 13 years at the Fed, I admit I was wrong about that!”