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US Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell said on Wednesday that there is never a reason for him to ask for a meeting with the President of the United States, a powerful message to Donald Trump.
Powell also said that if he had such a meeting, it’s because the elected leader sought the interaction.
“I’ve never asked for a meeting with any president, and I never will. There’s never a reason for me to ask for a meeting, it’s always been the other way,” Powell said at a press conference following the close of the Fed’s policy-setting committee meeting.
The remarks come as the Fed on Wednesday announced another pause in rate cuts and warned of higher risks to its inflation and unemployment goals, a likely reference to President Donald Trump’s tariff rollout.
Trump has repeatedly called for rate cuts and even threatened to fire Powell if it doesn’t happen. Still, the Fed chairman has been defiant in his approach to Trump’s demands.
Why did the Federal Reserve pause rate cuts?
Policymakers voted unanimously to hold the US central bank’s key lending rate at between 4.25 percent and 4.50 percent, the Fed said in a statement.
Speaking to reporters in Washington after the decision was published, Fed Chair Jerome Powell said there was “a great deal of uncertainty about, for example, where tariff policies are going to settle out.”
The bank has a dual mandate to act independently to tackle inflation and unemployment, primarily by hiking, holding, or easing its benchmark lending rate.
Many analysts have warned that the administration’s actions will likely push up inflation and unemployment, while slowing growth — at least in the short run.
The Fed said that “swings in net exports” did not appear to have affected the solid economic activity — a nod to the pre-tariff surge in imports in the first quarter ahead of the introduction of Donald Trump’s “liberation day” tariffs.
The Trump administration introduced steep levies last month on China, and lower “baseline” levies of 10 percent on goods from most other countries, sparking weeks of turbulence in the financial markets.
The White House also slapped higher tariffs on dozens of other trading partners, and then abruptly paused them until July to give the United States time to renegotiate existing trade agreements.
Data published in recent weeks point to an economic contraction in the first quarter of the year, while the unemployment rate has hovered close to historic lows, and the inflation rate has trended towards the Fed’s long-term target of two percent.
