DOJ vs Powell is abandoned

 

For now, anyway.  Until they get Warsh confirmed.

Always: every accusation is a confession

 

Also, he probably believes his own bullshit.

He did no such things.

Courts resisting fascism

 

If you don't bend the knee

Trump’s Justice Department targeted Federal Reserve chair Jerome Powell with a criminal investigation.

Trump crony and Fox cable pundit turned U.S. Attorney Jeanine Pirro, whose record in that office includes a humiliating number of grand juries rejecting indictments, purports to be looking into whether Powell misled Congress about the scope of the Federal Reserve’s renovation of its D.C. headquarters.

  All Rise News

A bullshit claim which has already been answered by Powell.

“The threat of criminal charges is a consequence of the Federal Reserve setting interest rates based on our best assessment of what will serve the public, rather than following the preferences of the president,” Powell said. “This is about whether the Fed will be able to continue to set interest rates based on evidence and economic conditions, or whether instead, monetary policy will be directed by political pressure or intimidation.”

[...]

Trump attempted a similar maneuver targeting Federal Reserve governor Lisa Cook, unsuccessfully trying to oust her from her role. The Roberts Court will consider whether to uphold a ruling blocking Cook’s termination on Jan. 21.

They seem to be disinclined to let Trump take over and fuck up the Federal Reserve - after all, that's their riches he'd be messing with - but we shall see.

The pretext is this stupid attempt to intimidate and rid Trump of Powell.  Every building has cost overruns, many of them dramatic.  Case in point:

This reopening of the bullshit claims are unlikely to go anywhere and seem to be aimed at making Powell's life miserable.  Trump's attempt to punish someone who doesn't bend the knee.  Typical tyrant behavior.

Also, re Hassett:

UPDATE 08:48 am:

So brave.

UPDATE 09:38 am:

Other than destroying the country and possibly blowing up the world, no one knows what he's doing, least of all himself.

Thom Tillis is a Republican.  Of course, he's already announced his retirement from Congress.

When you're a member of the Leopards Eating People's Faces Party, how do you think the leopards won't eat YOUR face?

UPDATE 05:43 pm:

Fed cuts interest rates

 

Cue Trump crowing about making Powell bow down.

Threatening Jerome Powell

 

He's going today.

Oh, to be a fly on the wall.

UPDATE 10:16 am:

Yes.  Turner isn't the first to lay the blame on Biden for something in Trump's term.

UPDATE 04:51 pm:

They taped it.  Apparently, PBS still has enough reserves to publish it.

On Thursday, reporters wound through cement mixers, front loaders, and plastic pipes as they got a close-up view of the active construction site that encompasses the Fed’s historic headquarters, known as the Marriner S. Eccles building, and a second building across 20th Street in Washington.

Fed staff, who declined to be identified, said that greater security requirements, rising materials costs and tariffs, and the need to comply with historic preservation measures drove up the cost of the project, which was budgeted in 2022 at $1.9 billion.

The staff pointed out new blast-resistant windows and seismic walls that were needed to comply with modern building codes and security standards set out by the Department of Homeland Security. The Fed has to build with the highest level of security in mind, Fed staff said, including something called “progressive collapse,” in which only parts of the building would fall if hit with explosives.

  PBS

Jeez, are they that concerned about what Trump might do to them?

Plans for the renovation were first approved by the Fed’s governing board in 2017. The project then wended its way through several local commissions for approval, at least one of which, the Commission for Fine Arts, included several Trump appointees. The commission pushed for more marble in the second of the two buildings the Fed is renovating.

[...]

Fed staff also said tariffs and inflationary increases in building material prices drove up costs. Trump in 2018 imposed a 25% duty on steel and 10% on aluminum. He increased them this year to 50%. Steel prices are up about 60% since the plans were approved, while construction materials costs overall are up about 50%, according to government data.

And now Trump is bitching about it and trying to use the cost as a bludgeon against Powell, who really has nothing to do with the building. Also, Powell's term ends in May 2026. (Powell and Stephen Colbert.)

Trump wants Powell to dramatically slash the Fed’s benchmark interest rate under the belief that inflation is not a problem, but Powell wants to see how Trump’s tariffs impact the economy before making any rate cuts that could potentially cause inflation to accelerate.

The renovation project has emerged as a possible justification by Trump to take the extraordinary step of firing Powell for cause.

[...]

The Supreme Court found that Trump had the power to remove board members of other independent agencies, but indicated that a Fed chair could only be removed for cause.

[...]

White House budget director Russell Vought suggested in a July 10 letter to Powell that changes to the renovations in order to save money might have violated the National Capital Planning Act.

What?

“There’s nothing that tells me that he should step down right now,” said Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent, whom Trump has floated as a potential replacement for Powell, in a recent interview with Fox Business. “He’s been a good public servant.”

You know Trump heard that, right?

When asked last week if the costly rebuilding could be grounds to fire Powell, Trump said, “I think it sort of is.”

“When you spend $2.5 billion on, really, a renovation,” Trump said, “I think it’s really disgraceful.”

No comment.

Trump said the project cost $3.1 billion, much higher than the Fed’s $2.5 billion figure, while Powell, standing next to him, silently shook his head.

“This came from us?” Powell said, then figuring out that Trump was including the renovation of the Martin Building that was finished five years ago.

“Do you expect any more additional cost overruns?” Trump asked.

“Don’t expect them,” Powell said.

Trump said in his career as a real estate developer he would fire someone for cost overruns. The president joked that he would back off Powell if he lowered interest rates.

  PBS

And...why doesn't the black guy (Tim Scott) get a helmet?

Is it because he stupidly says he wants to come there to see why there are overruns on the cost?  Ask anybody who has done any renovating or building if there were overruns on the estimated cost?  And that's without Trump putting tariffs on building materials.

No FEMA, No Insurance, No Mortgage

 

King of all he surveys

 

The answer is "no" of course, but don't expect him not to try.

Massive new flag poles are being installed on the White House grounds today, after President Donald Trump said they were desperately needed and he would pay for them himself.

  

Sure.

The placement of the two nearly 100-foot-tall flagpoles — one on the north lawn and one on the south lawn — began early this morning. The flags will be raised around 11 a.m., the president said.

Jesus.

Jerome Powell speech at Princeton

 Contrast with Trump's commencement speech at West Point where he rambled about trophy wives and yachts.

SCOTUS leaves Trump more power

Humphrey's Executor is on the chopping block.

The Supreme Court majority all but declared Thursday that it is ready to overturn a nearly century-old precedent meant to protect independent agencies from at-will firing by the President.

It’s the last brick to fall in the division between the President and the parts of the executive branch Congress created to be beyond his reach, turning the second branch of government into an all-powerful tool to be wielded by one man.

Justice Elena Kagan, writing for the three dissenting liberals, dispensed with the usual niceties to upbraid her conservative colleagues for bending to President Trump’s whims, and doing so in a two-page ruling on the emergency docket.

[...]

In another sign of where the majority is leaning, it mentioned, out of the blue, that the Federal Reserve, for some reason, is uniquely protected from the President’s whims due to its “unique structure” and “distinct historical tradition.”

  TPM

They might want a king, but they don't want the king to destroy global stability and the judges' own wealth with some idiotic policy like across-the-board tariffs.

“But then, today’s order poses a puzzle. For the Federal Reserve’s independence rests on the same constitutional and analytic foundations as that of the NLRB, MSPB, FTC, FCC, and so on — which is to say it rests largely on Humphrey’s,” Kagan wrote, citing the Court’s precedent protecting these members from at-will removal. “So the majority has to offer a different story…”

“One way of making new law on the emergency docket (the deprecation of Humphrey’s) turns out to require yet another (the creation of a bespoke Federal Reserve exception),” she added. “If the idea is to reassure the markets, a simpler — and more judicial — approach would have been to deny the President’s application for a stay on the continued authority of Humphrey’s.”

The Supreme Court vacated an appeals court’s order requiring President Donald Trump to reinstate two members of independent federal boards he fired without cause earlier this year.

  Democracy Docket

Not so independent, then.

The court’s 6-3 order, issued along ideological lines, upholds Trump’s dismissal of National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) member Gwynne Wilcox and Merit Systems Protection Board (MSPB) member Cathy Harris as lawsuits challenging their dismissals continue.

While they can proceed, the court’s order is a significant blow to the viability of their lawsuits. It also indicates that the court’s Republican-appointed majority may be leaning toward expanding Trump’s powers by overturning a 90-year-old ruling that protects independent agencies from undue presidential influence.

[...]

“The Government faces greater risk of harm from an order allowing a removed officer to continue exercising the executive power than a wrongfully removed officer faces from being unable to perform her statutory duty,” the majority stated.

If there was no cause for the firing, where is the harm in leaving them in position?

Their dismissals are part of the Trump administration’s broad challenge to Humphrey’s Executor v. U.S., which has for decades allowed independent agencies to operate without direct control from the White House.

The Department of Justice has told the Supreme Court it intends to ask justices to overturn Humphrey’s Executor, arguing that laws limiting a president’s power to remove certain officials are unconstitutional.

Is it unconstitutional, or does it just butt against SCOTUS' ruling allowing Trump to do whatever the hell he wants while he's president?

If the court ultimately overturns Humphrey’s Executor, Trump would gain extraordinary powers to investigate and penalize private businesses and individuals, tilt elections and, potentially, use monetary policy for political purposes.

He already does that, without having the official power.

Before the Supreme Court’s order Wilcox and Harris had been dismissed and reinstated five times.

America running smoothly.

“One way of making new law on the emergency docket (the deprecation of Humphrey’s) turns out to require yet another (the creation of a bespoke Federal Reserve exception),” [Justice Kagan said]. “If the idea is to reassure the markets, a simpler — and more judicial — approach would have been to deny the President’s application for a stay on the continued authority of Humphrey’s.”

The majority further tipped its hand, she pointed out, by rationalizing granting Trump’s stay request by saying that it would stop the members of the two embattled agencies from being fired and rehired as the litigation proceeds. But Kagan notes that the two lower courts, as they must while Humphrey’s Executor still stands, reinstated the fired members. To allow the firings to stand, she wrote, is allowing the “President to overrule Humphrey’s by fiat.”

[...]

She also thwacked her colleagues for their explanation of the balance of injuries, noting that the side of the agencies does not boil down to the fired members’ interest in keeping their “nifty jobs” but the interest of Congress to create agencies that the President cannot destroy.

[...]

“I would deny the President’s application,” she added. “I would do so based on the will of Congress, this Court’s seminal decision approving independent agencies’ for-cause protections, and the ensuing 90 years of this Nation’s history.”

[...]

Coupled with the Trump administration’s annihilation of the civil service, the executive branch will [with the eventual overturning of Humphrey's] become something much closer to a fiefdom, an extension of presidential power with few institutional guardrails. This was a guiding light of Project 2025, a plan realized in the aftermath of the first administration, when civil servants and non-toadies in the executive branch proved frustrating obstacles to Trump’s vision.

  TPM

UPDATE 05/26/2025:

UPDATE 05/28/2025:

No modern president has ever come close to the large-scale personnel purges that we have seen under Mr. Trump, and for good reason: Many of the officials in question are protected by law from being fired at will by the president. Mr. Trump maintains that laws limiting the president’s ability to fire high-level officials are unconstitutional. In making that argument, he is drawing on a series of recent Supreme Court opinions emphasizing the importance of presidential control over subordinate officials and invalidating removal limitations at agencies like the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau.

[...]

[I]n a case involving members of the National Labor Relations and Merit Systems Protection Boards, the Supreme Court quietly blessed, in an unsigned order, some or all of these firings. In doing so, the court effectively allowed the president to neutralize some of the last remaining sites of independent expertise and authority in the executive branch.

The court sought to cast its intervention as temporary, procedural and grounded in considerations of stability, with the order noting concerns about the “disruptive effect of the repeated removal and reinstatement of officers during the pendency of this litigation.”

In truth, the decision was radical. Whatever one thinks about the underlying question of presidential authority, the court should not have disposed of the case this way. It effectively overruled an important and nearly century-old precedent central to the structure of the federal government without full briefing or argument. And it did so in a thinly reasoned, unsigned, two-page order handing the president underspecified but considerable new authority.

  NYT

Going down

 

Trump's answer would be to kill the messenger.

Trump wants to "terminate" Jerome Powell

President Donald Trump’s significant policy changes, including on tariffs, are unlike anything seen in modern history, putting the Federal Reserve in uncharted waters, Chair Jerome Powell said Wednesday.

“These are very fundamental policy changes,” Powell said at an event hosted by the Economic Club of Chicago. “There isn’t a modern experience of how to think about this.”

Powell said “the level of the tariff increases announced so far is significantly larger than anticipated” and that the lingering uncertainty around tariffs could inflict lasting economic damage. With Trump’s tariffs putting the economy on a path toward weaker growth, higher unemployment and faster inflation — all at the same time — the Fed is also facing a situation it hasn’t dealt with in about half a century.

“We may find ourselves in the challenging scenario in which our dual-mandate goals are in tension,” Powell said.

US stocks tumbled as Powell spoke: The Dow was down 700 points, or 1.7%. The broader S&P 500 fell 2.5%. The tech-heavy Nasdaq Composite slid 3.5%.

[...]

Powell said the Fed’s best move for the moment is to stand pat until the data clearly shows how the US economy is responding to Trump’s policies.

But it’s only a matter of time until Trump’s tariffs stoke inflation, push up unemployment and weaken economic growth, according to most economists, especially if the massive “reciprocal” tariffs that went into effect briefly on April 9 are put back in place.

  CNN

"Our independence is a matter of law...In our statute, we're not removable except for cause. We serve very long terms, seemingly endless terms. So we're protected in the law," Powell said.

"Congress could change that law, but I don't think there's any danger of that. Fed independence has pretty broad support across both political parties and in both sides of the Hill."

In his speech addressing the outlook for interest rates, he said the Federal Reserve can stay patient and wait to see how tariffs and other economic policies of the Trump Administration play out before making any changes. There are fears of a recession.

[...]

"For the time being, we are well positioned to wait for greater clarity" on the impact of policy changes in areas such as immigration, taxation, regulation, and tariffs, he added.

Earlier in April, Powell had told a conference that the tariffs, and their likely impacts on the economy and inflation, are "significantly larger than expected."

He also said that the import taxes will probably lead to "at least a temporary rise in inflation," but added that "it is also possible that the effects could be more persistent."

  Newsweek

“Jerome Powell just laid down the law with Trump,” David Russell, global head of market strategy at TradeStation, said in commentary issued Wednesday. “It was a clear warning about stagflation, and a declaration that the Fed won’t enable the White House with rate cuts.”

  CNN

Well, as you might have guessed, that didn't go down well in Mar-Embargo. The Orange King howled.

Trump thinks the Federal Reserve should cut interest rates more quickly than it is to help fuel economic growth, but rate-setters are juggling the impacts of his tariffs, which threaten to push inflation higher, a situation that cutting rates would worsen.

The Federal Reserve's decision-making is supposed to be free from political interference so it can make calls it believes are right for the country and the economy rather than in the interests of presidents or lawmakers.

In a post on his Truth Social platform, Trump noted that the European Central Bank (ECB) is expected to cut interest rates again, and suggested Powell should be doing the same, calling him "always TOO LATE AND WRONG".

"Oil prices are down, groceries (even eggs!) are down, and the USA is getting RICH ON TARIFFS," Trump wrote.

  Newsweek

I'll stop for a moment while you finish laughing.

"Too Late should have lowered Interest Rates, like the ECB, long ago, but he should certainly lower them now. Powell's termination cannot come fast enough!"

Trump's fractious relationship with Powell dates back to his first term, when he tried to pressure the Fed to keep interest rates low while the economy was booming. Trump says he is entitled as president to comment on the Fed's actions.

We're ALL entitled to comment on the Fed's actions.

Trump picked Powell for the Fed back in 2017 and former President Joe Biden reselected him in 2021.

[...]

Powell's term ends in 2026 and Trump cannot fire him, though he nominates the replacement.

[...]

The Federal Reserve is independent of the government so it can set monetary policy without the direct intervention of politicians.

For now.

The dual-mandate of the Federal Reserve's monetary policy, set by Congress, is to maximize employment while keeping prices stable, targeting a 2 percent rate of inflation.

[...]

Presidents traditionally do not comment on monetary policy decisions to preserve the Fed's independence in decision-making.

Trump is, if anything, NOT a traditional president.

The rate-setting Federal Open Market Committee is set to meet again between May 6 and 7, when they will have a somewhat clearer picture of how the global trade war kicked off by Trump is impacting the economy.

But there are likely to be a number of still unresolved issues—and new ones—around trade, as negotiations between the U.S. and its trading partners continue, and the economic conflict with China heats up even more. Uncertainty reigns.

Things are not going to improve any time soon.

UPDATE 05/26/2025:

 

Not a good look

...but hey, do what you want...you will anyway.

It's a statement, I guess

If everyone would have joined, that would have been a STATEMENT.

Batten down the hatches

Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell stressed the importance of keeping the coronavirus contagion contained as the U.S. economy bounces back from its deepest contraction in decades.

[...]

The Fed and Treasury have worked together to launch nine emergency lending programs aimed at providing backstop credit to everything from municipalities to medium-sized businesses. Those actions helped lower borrowing costs and keep the financial system liquid in a time of stress.

The Fed chair struck an optimistic note on what he is seeing as economic activity resumes. Hiring is picking up, he noted, and spending is increasing, though 20 million Americans have lost their jobs.

"The path forward for the economy is extraordinarily uncertain and will depend in large part on our success in containing the virus," he said.

  alJazeera

That barn door should have been closed a long time ago. It's too late now.

...but hey, do what you want...you will anyway.

UPDATE:

Economic recovery non-starter

The most important data for the United States economy right now are the "medical metrics" around the coronavirus pandemic, says Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell.

In an interview with US TV network CBS' 60 Minutes news programme broadcast on Sunday night, Powell outlined the likely need for three to six more months of government financial help for firms and families.

He repeatedly returned to health issues as being central to the success of a US economic reopening, calling on Americans to "help each other through this" by adhering to social-distancing rules as state and local governments begin to lift restrictions on social and economic activities.

  alJazeera

Pie in the sky, Jerome.

"If we are thoughtful and careful about how we reopen the economy so that people take these social distancing measures forward and try to do what we can not to have another outbreak ... then the recovery can begin fairly soon," Powell said.

In other words, forget about it.

"Assuming there is not a second wave of the coronavirus, I think you will see the economy recover steadily through the second half of this year," he said.

Nice try, Jerome. We're all assuming there WILL be a second wave.

As Congress debates possible further economic relief, Powell has stretched the limits of typical central bank commentary, directly calling for more fiscal spending. In Sunday's interview, he even urged people to wash their hands and wear masks to aid the recovery.

Masks are for wimps. Doesn't he know that?

Under the best of circumstances it will be a long road, Powell said, with additional job losses likely through June, a rebound that takes time to "gather steam" and some parts of the economy like the travel and entertainment industries possibly under pressure until there is a vaccine. The economic devastation already has been severe. Powell said unemployment may hit 25 percent before it begins to fall and gross domestic product may contract at an annualised rate of perhaps 20 percent in the April through June period.

[...]

"For the economy to fully recover people will have to be fully confident and that may have to await the arrival of a vaccine."

And not one produced in "warp speed" that "may not be safe and effective."

...but hey, do what you want...you will anyway.

Fake news, no doubt

President Trump, in an explosive tirade Monday, urged Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin to encourage Federal Reserve Chair Jerome H. Powell to do more to stimulate the economy, three officials familiar with the exchange said, revealing the president’s mounting fury as his administration struggles to corral economic fallout from the novel coronavirus.

  WaPo

Not a meltdown. Everything is running smoothly.

During that tense Monday meeting in the Oval Office, Trump fumed that Powell never should have been appointed and is damaging the nation and his presidency.

He's been squawking about that for three years now. And, btw, who appointed Powell anyway?

He then told Mnuchin, who had encouraged Trump to nominate Powell in 2017, to engage with the chair and ask him to take more dramatic steps to arrest the stock market’s plummet, according to three White House officials and a senior Republican. The people spoke on the condition of anonymity because they weren’t authorized to reveal the exchange.

He will NEVER get rid of all the leakers.

Trump initially tried to brush aside concerns about the coronavirus’s impact on the economy, saying it would be short-lived, but the Oval Office meeting struck some of his advisers because it showed how furious he had become.

Jesus, WaPo, he's already suing you for an opinion article, are you trying to make it worse?

The stock market has fallen precipitously since mid-February because global supply chains are seizing up, consumers are pulling back sharply on spending, and companies are retrenching as they wait to see what the effects of the coronavirus will be. Interest rates are already very low after an emergency cut by the Fed last week, and they are typically lowered to spur more borrowing and spending. Right now, however, many businesses and consumers aren’t spending money because they don’t know what the future will look like.

They're saving their money for their medical bills.

Senior aides, worried that the stock market would crater if Trump tried to fire Powell, have discouraged him from attempting this for two years. It’s unclear whether Trump has the legal authority to fire Powell, who has said he plans to serve out his four-year term as chair, which ends in early 2022.

He has the absolute right to fire Powell. Just ask him.

...but hey, do what you want...you will anyway.

Beat him to the punch

Wasting no time to get out in front of whatever the Orange Liar might say...

Hmmmm.  That wasn't on Trump's published schedule.

At the President's invitation, Chair Powell met with the President and the Treasury Secretary Monday morning at the White House to discuss the economy, growth, employment and inflation.

Chair Powell's comments were consistent with his remarks at his congressional hearings last week. He did not discuss his expectations for monetary policy, except to stress that the path of policy will depend entirely on incoming information that bears on the outlook for the economy.

Finally, Chair Powell said that he and his colleagues on the Federal Open Market Committee will set monetary policy, as required by law, to support maximum employment and stable prices and will make those decisions based solely on careful, objective and non-political analysis.

  Federal Reserve

Ouch.

Rise and whine*

What?  YOU ALWAYS win.  So you've been telling us.



Unsigned.

Don't worry.  You and Mitch have gerrymandered the Supreme Court.

*h/t pourmecoffee

UPDATE:  For the record:



Some day, maybe someone will go over his tweets and tell us which, if any, are NOT lies.