The Fed 5: Bessent’s short list for Powell’s job

Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent has whittled down his short list of candidates to replace Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell to five individuals, he said on Air Force One, The Wall Street Journal reported.

Some have connections to the central bank and the White House, while another is a Wall Street powerhouse.

President Donald Trump has kept up his verbal criticism of Powell for not cutting interest rates fast or deep enough, calling the chairman a “stubborn moron” and “Jerome Too Late Powell”, among other things in social media posts and publicly. Bessent plans to brief Trump on the candidates in full after Thanksgiving, although Powell’s term as chairman ends on May 15, 2026. 

FOX Business takes a look at the contenders ahead of the Federal Reserve’s October meeting on Wednesday in which policymakers are seen cutting interest rates by 25 basis points, lowering the target to a range of 3.75% to 4%. The anticipated rate cut follows the same move the Fed made at its September meeting. Markets also expect another rate cut of that size at the Fed’s subsequent meeting in December.

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Here’s the list in alphabetical order. 

Michelle Bowman

Federal Reserve Governor Bowman, who also serves as the Fed’s vice chair for supervision, became one of the first dissenters at the July meeting, favoring rate cuts, while the central bank left rates unchanged. She has also made her case for future rates through year-end. 

Kevin Hassett 

Hassett is on his second spin through Trump’s orbit. He is the director of the National Economic Council. In the first Trump administration, he was a senior advisor and chairman of the Council of Economic Advisers. Both agencies work in tandem with the White House on economic policies. Hassett said the latest consumer inflation data, which showed a less-than-expected 3% annual increase, is a sign costs are falling.

“Our expectation is that inflation is decelerating and that will take all the pressure off the Fed to keep on the path that they are on,” he said during an interview on FOX Business Network’s “Varney & Co.”

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Rick Rieder 

Rick Rieder, BlackRock’s chief investment officer of global fixed income, oversees $3.2 trillion in customer assets for the world’s largest asset manager. BlackRock has more than $10 trillion under management. During an interview with FOX Business’ Liz Claman in August, Reider was asked about being considered for the role.

“When I first heard it, I thought it’d be the greatest honor of my life. I mean, to actually be considered in a position like that and think about the responsibility, and quite frankly, what I thought about is the ability, and I think why serving your country is such a powerful dynamic, is the ability to help people through monetary policy, through economic transmission, is really powerful,” he said.  

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Christopher Waller 

Waller, like his colleague Bowman, was also among the dissenters in July. The duo signaled a growing divide within the Federal Reserve, which has come under fire for waiting too long to cut rates amid higher inflation and a slowing labor market. 

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Kevin Warsh 

The former Federal Reserve governor, who was one of the early contenders for Fed chair, has been a longtime critic of the central bank.

“I think their track record is really quite poor in forecasting the growth of the economy from policies like the ones the president put in place. And their inflation forecasts have been terrible, too. That’s why they were so late, and that’s why we had this surge of inflation that’s done the most harm to the hardest-working Americans among us. So, that track record, I think, still matters,” he said during an appearance on “Maria Bartiromo’s Wall Street.” 

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FOX Business’ Eric Revell contributed to this report.