President-elect Donald Trump said he has no plans to replace Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell once he returns to the White House, saying “I don’t see it.”
Powell, whose term as Fed chair expires in May 2026, told reporters last month that he wouldn’t step aside early if Trump asked for his resignation.
“I think if I told him to, he would,” Trump said Sunday on NBC’s Meet the Press, his first network television interview since winning the U.S. election in November. “But if I asked him to, he probably wouldn’t.”
Powell made it clear within days of the election that he’s ready to defend the Fed’s independence from political pressure, insisting the incoming president doesn’t have the power to fire him or other senior Fed leaders.
Trump has previously said he should have a say in monetary policy and the setting of interest rates. “I think I have the right to say, ‘I think you should go up or down a little bit.’ I don’t think I should be allowed to order it,” Trump said in a Bloomberg News interview in October. “But I think I have the right to put in comments as to whether or not interest rates should go up or down.”
Trump also ridiculed the Fed chair’s role as “the greatest job in government,” saying, “you show up to the office once a month, and you say, ‘Let’s see, flip a coin.’”
In the NBC interview transcript released Sunday, Trump was responding to a question about Powell’s statement refusing to step down if asked. While Trump appointed Powell, he explored whether he could fire or demote him during his first term in office after the Fed raised interest rates a number of times.
Fed spokesperson declined to comment on Trump’s latest remarks.
Powell, for his part, has said he doesn’t expect tensions with the incoming administration. At a news conference on Nov. 7, he was asked whether he’d leave his post if Trump asked him to. “No,” Powell said.
Tariff Threats
Trump renewed his threat to impose tariffs on U.S. trading partners if necessary, singling out the trade balance with Mexico and Canada and trying to suggest that U.S. trade with the two countries amounts to subsidizing their economies.
“Why are we subsidizing these countries? If we’re going to subsidize them, let them become a state,” he said. “We’re subsidizing Mexico and we’re subsidizing Canada and we’re subsidizing many countries all over the world.”
Asked about the broad consensus among economists that tariffs raise prices for consumers and whether he could guarantee that American families won’t pay more, Trump said, “I can’t guarantee anything. I can’t guarantee tomorrow.”
