Senate votes 48-27 to confirm Stephen Miran as Fed governor but court rules Cook may remain in place
Senate Republicans voted on Monday to confirm a senior Trump official to the Federal Reserve’s board of governors as the White House raced to strengthen the US president’s control over the central bank ahead of its latest meeting.
Hours before Fed policymakers convene for their September decision on interest rates, the Senate voted 48 to 27 to confirm Stephen Miran – already chair of Donald Trump’s council of economic advisers – as a governor.
The vote concluded just as a US appeals court declined the Trump administration’s request to fire Lisa Cook, a governor appointed by Joe Biden, before the two-day policy meeting begins on Tuesday. The ruling from the US court of appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit means that Cook may remain in her position during the policy meeting where the Fed is expected to cut interest rates.
Trying to keep things factual and not inject my opinion, snark, or other whatabouts into things: The president has the power to remove people from the Federal Reserve Board, but only for cause. Basically, you have to have really effed up, a simple disagreement probably isn’t enough or he would have done it a long time ago.
Somehow (not sure) word got out that she purchased two homes within a short amount of time from each other, and had both as a “primary residence” in the paperwork. This can have more favorable terms when financing, but AFAIK you can’t have multiple “primary” homes. That could constitute fraud if true and pursued. Trump used that as his cause for firing her.
Of course, this was never adjudicated in court. And now there are new things coming out where she actually listed one home as a vacation home. Which should be a pretty damn good defense against that allegations if that’s the case.
Well if anyone knows about fraud in financing it’s definitely Trump.