Trump nominates Powell critic for vacant Fed seat

What happened

President Donald Trump said Thursday he will nominate Stephen Miran, the chair of his Council of Economic Advisers, to fill the seat on the Federal Reserve Board of Governors left vacant by last week's unexpected resignation of board member Adriana Kugler.

Trump said that Miran, a fellow critic of Fed chair Jerome Powell's interest rate policies, would serve until the end of January, when Kugler's term was due to expire.

Who said what

If confirmed, Miran would "add a near-certain vote in support of lower interest rates," joining Trump's first-term Fed picks Christopher Waller and Michelle Bowman, The Associated Press said. But "even with Miran on the board," many of the other 12 Fed officials who vote on rate policy "remain concerned that Trump's sweeping tariffs could push inflation higher in the coming months."

Miran last year argued against the Fed's rate cuts, saying the board was not worried enough about inflation. But since joining Trump's White House, he has argued that "inflation isn't likely to be a problem" under Trump's policies, The Wall Street Journal said. In a paper he co-wrote last year, Miran also advised "shortening board member terms and clarifying that members serve at the will of the U.S. president, as well as imposing bans on the revolving door between the executive branch and the Fed."

Subscribe to The Week

Escape your echo chamber. Get the facts behind the news, plus analysis from multiple perspectives.

SUBSCRIBE & SAVE

Sign up for The Week's Free Newsletters

From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.

From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.

Sign up

What next?

Kugler's resignation took effect today, but it "isn't clear how soon Miran could go through the Senate confirmation process," the Journal said. Congress is "on recess until September," and the next Fed policy meeting is Sept. 16-17.