President Donald Trump stopped short of calling for Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell‘s removal during a White House meeting in which the president called Powell “terrible.”
“Oh, he’ll leave if I ask him to, he’ll be out of there,” Trump said at a press event with Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni on Thursday afternoon. Hours earlier, Trump posted on social media that Powell’s exit “cannot come soon enough.”
The president declined to answer when asked if he is trying to force Powell out, though at another moment he said, “If I want him out, he’ll be out of there real fast. Believe me.”
Powell, who heads an agency set up to be independent from the president, has been under attack from Trump after the chairman said there could be a “temporary rise in inflation” due to fallout from the administration’s retaliatory tariffs on U.S. trading partners. Trump has also bristled at the pace at which Powell is cutting interest rates.
“I don’t think he’s doing the job,” Trump continued. “He’s too late, always too late. Little slow, and I’m not happy with him.”
Before the Oval Office meeting, Trump took to Truth Social to blast Powell over the European Central Bank’s decision to lower its rates.
“The ECB is expected to cut interest rates for the 7th time, and yet, ‘Too Late’ Jerome Powell of the Fed, who is always TOO LATE AND WRONG, yesterday issued a report which was another, and typical, complete ‘mess!’” Trump posted Thursday morning. “Powell’s termination cannot come fast enough!”
Later, when asked again about firing Powell over the rate cuts, Trump elaborated on his thinking.
“Well, I think he should do the rate cuts. Because I think if Europe has done it … he puts us at a disadvantage to Europe. I mean, he plays right into their hands,” Trump said. “So I think he should do the rate cuts. We don’t have really any inflation now. I just said the major things are going down. Oil is great. Oil is way ahead of schedule, and that’s because of our policies.”
TRUMP TRASHES POWELL AS ‘TOO LATE AND WRONG,’ HINTING AT FED CHAIRMAN’S ‘TERMINATION’
“And I told you in certain states, we have less than $2 for gasoline, and food is down,” Trump continued. “Groceries, as we call it, are down. Other than interest rates, everything’s down.”
Powell was appointed Fed chairman in 2018 during Trump’s first term. Former President Joe Biden appointed him to another term in 2022. The chairman’s term is set to expire in May 2026.