Donald Trump Has ‘Cordial’ Meeting with Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell

President Donald Trump on Monday confirmed he met Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell at the White House to discuss monetary policy.

“Just finished a very good & cordial meeting at the White House with Jay Powell of the Federal Reserve,” Trump wrote on Twitter.

The meeting was first disclosed by Powell in a press statement, revealing he attended the meeting with Trump and Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin “at the president’s invitation.”

Trump has repeatedly excoriated Powell and the Federal Reserve for increasing interest rates too quickly and not lowering them quickly enough to help the economy.

During a speech to the Economic Club of New York last week, Trump criticized the Federal Reserve for “a near-record number of rate increases and quantitative tightening” during the economic growth of his administration.

Trump noted other nations in the world were lowering interest rates to near-zero or even negative interest rates.

“We are competing against these other countries nonetheless, and the Federal Reserve doesn’t let us play at that game,” he said.

In his statement Monday, Powell reassured critics he did not discuss expectations for monetary policy during the meeting with the president.

But Trump said “everything was discussed” including interest rates, negative interest, low inflation, easing, Dollar strength and its effect on manufacturing, trade with China, the European Union and other countries.

Powell’s statement said the Federal Reserve would continue to set monetary policy independently.

“Chair Powell said that he and his colleagues on the Federal Open Market Committee will set monetary policy, as required by law, to support maximum employment and stable prices and will make those decisions based solely on careful, objective and non-political analysis,” the statement from the Federal Reserve read.

Just finished a very good & cordial meeting at the White House with Jay Powell of the Federal Reserve. Everything was discussed including interest rates, negative interest, low inflation, easing, Dollar strength & its effect on manufacturing, trade with China, E.U. & others, etc.

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) November 18, 2019