WASHINGTON – A California Republican admitted to not being a “super-duper financial expert” — then said he understood President Donald Trump’s urge to break with political convention and fire Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell.
That move, many financial experts and Democrats have said, will mean disaster for the U.S. economy.
“I don't get the feeling [Powell] is very responsive to the cues of the economy like you should be,” Rep. Doug LaMalfa (R-CA) told Raw Story at the U.S. Capitol, as Washington fixated on whether Trump will fire Powell, as he is reportedly preparing to do.
“That's where the frustration comes in here, it seems to me,” LaMalfa said. “Like [I’m] not a super-duper financial expert on it but they could be more responsive to what we see happening here. I would like to see interest rates adjusted.
“Maybe he’ll just go away on his own.”
Trump has raged publicly about Powell, on Wednesday telling reporters: “He’s a terrible Fed chair. I was surprised he was appointed.”
Countless sources pointed out that Trump nominated Powell in 2017 and oversaw his appointment the following year.
Trump added that he “was surprised that [President Joe] Biden put him in, extended him”, and said that though he was not “planning on doing anything” and a firing was “highly unlikely,” he was “very very concerned.”
Powell was actually appointed by Trump during his first term.
The New York Times first reported that Trump has prepared a letter with which to fire Powell. Aides to the president have said he is looking into whether he has the authority to do so.
Rep. LaMalfa told Raw Story Powell’s firing “would probably be handy” for Republicans, but added: “I don't know if the protocol allows for just being able to kick the guy out.”
Then he asked: “You know what his term is?”
Fed Chairs typically serve four-year terms, operating independently of the presidents who appoint them. Powell’s second term ends next year. But in Trump’s own second term, the White House has shown scant regard for convention.
LaMalfa said: “I understand the frustration, but there does have to be some sense of, you know, continuity that is about the political thing too.
“I just hope they come to the realization on their own that we need to … align interest rates with how good the economy is, instead of just … interest rates are going to be bad for managing our debt around here, so we all want to see them low for a lot of reasons.”
Like every other House Republican but one, LaMalfa recently voted for Trump’s “big beautiful bill” of tax cuts and spending cuts, which is projected to add $4 trillion to the national debt.
Democrats do not think Trump should fire Powell.
“I think [it would be] very dangerous,” Rep. Don Beyer (D-VA) told Raw Story.
“Oh, my God, yeah. There's a great essay in the New York Times … about you want 35% inflation, make the Fed not independent.
“If [the Fed Chair is] serving at the pleasure of the president, then they're gonna do short-term stuff all the time. You need long-term thinking, which Powell’s been great at and virtually everyone” says it.
Raw Story asked: “So you think meddling is bad?”
Citing an economist hero of free-market Republicans, Beyer said: “You all go back to Milton Friedman. They're all big fans of Milton Friedman. He said don't adjust it at all. You know, figure out what the rate of increase of the population is, and let the money supply increase that much and just stay out of it.”
Raw Story asked: “You think if [Trump] did it” and fired Powell, would it “hit like an A-bomb” on Wall Street?
Beyer said: “Oh my God! I just don't know how he could. You know, Trump cares about the stock market. And the tariffs [on international trade] have been bad for the stock market, and then we pull them back up, but this would be pretty interesting, pretty fast. And inflation is slowly ticking up. And most of the tariffs, three-quarters haven't even hit yet.
“It could get a lot worse, and you have no Jay Powell, you put a lap dog in there who's saying, ‘Mr. President, what should I do now?’ Like our speaker?”
That was a shot at Rep. Mike Johnson (R-LA), who apart from advocating for the release of the Epstein files has been a remarkably compliant speaker when it comes to Trump’s priorities.
On the other side of the Capitol, in the U.S. Senate, one Republican firebrand was in no doubt that Trump should fire Powell and would be within his rights to do so, according to precedent as well as politics.
Sen. Bernie Moreno (R-OH) cited widely reported “cost overruns” relating to a renovation of the Federal Reserve building as part of Powell’s alleged “mismanagement of the Fed [including] losing hundreds of billions of dollars in the private sector.”
Experts say President Trump likely does not have sufficient cause to fire Powell. Moreno rejects such experts.
“Jerome Powell absolutely needs to go,” Moreno told reporters. “He's costing his country hundreds of billions of dollars and [is] just completely inept. Would you be able to lose $300 billion? OK.”