Former President Donald Trump, who is highly likely to be elected as the opposition Republican Party's presidential candidate in the November U.S. presidential election, mentioned the possibility of dismissing Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell, whom he had handpicked, when he returns to power. It appears that he is belatedly taking revenge on Chairman Powell for rejecting his request to lower the benchmark interest rate to stimulate the economy during his administration.
In an interview with conservative Fox News on the 2nd, former President Trump was asked whether he would reappoint Chairman Powell if he becomes president, and he responded firmly, “I will not.” He then claimed that Chairman Powell is a “political figure” and that “he will do anything to help the Democratic Party.”
Chairman Powell began his term in February 2018 and was reappointed in 2022. The Federal Reserve Chairman serves a four-year term and can be reappointed several times. In November 2017, the first year of his administration, former President Trump replaced then-Fed Chairman Janet Yellen, who was expected to be re-elected, and selected Powell, a fellow Republican, as the new head.
After the outbreak of the novel coronavirus infection (Corona 19), Chairman Powell began to be viewed as a thorn in the side when he did not follow his demands for an interest rate cut. At the time, former President Trump disparaged Powell as a “traitor” and “fool,” saying that the U.S. economy was not rising like a rocket because the Federal Reserve kept interest rates excessively high. He even went so far as to say, “I don’t know who is the greater enemy of the United States, Chinese President Xi Jinping or Powell.” At the time, four former Federal Reserve Chairmen, including Alan Greenspan, who could not bear to see this situation, even published a media contribution saying, “Guarantee the political independence of the Federal Reserve.”
Meanwhile, it is assessed that the judicial risk of former President Trump, who was indicted on four criminal charges last year on charges of overturning the results of the 2020 presidential election, has largely disappeared. On the 2nd, the Federal District Court in Washington, the capital, announced that it had decided to postpone for the time being the trial schedule related to the charge that former President Trump incited his supporters to storm the Washington Capitol on January 6, 2021 in protest of his defeat in the 2020 presidential election. It was not disclosed when the trial would resume.
The trial was originally scheduled to begin next month. Former President Trump has consistently argued that he, as the incumbent president at the time, had ‘immunity’ and therefore could not be prosecuted. Last December, when the Federal District Court, which was the first trial, did not accept the decision, we immediately appealed. His lawyers said, “It is very disadvantageous for former President Trump to undergo a criminal trial for several months in the midst of a presidential campaign. He claimed, “It is a kind of election interference.”
Even if the appellate court, which is the second trial, rejects Trump's claim, if former President Trump appeals again to the Federal Supreme Court, which is the final trial, the final result of the trial will not be announced until the November presidential election. If former President Trump succeeds in coming back to power, there is a high possibility that he will ‘self-pardon’ himself. There is an analysis that it has become difficult for this issue to act as an obstacle to his return to power.
0 Comments