Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell meets with Trump at White House

Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell met with President Trump at the White House on Thursday to discuss economic growth and other goals, the central bank said in a statement.

The meeting, held at Mr. Trump’s invitation, comes after the president has repeatedly pressed Mr. Powell to lower the Fed’s benchmark rate. Mr. Trump earlier this month called Mr. Powell a “fool” for acting “too late” in cutting rates.

According to the statement, Powell told the president at the meeting that the Fed would make its decisions based on “careful, objective, and nonpolitical analysis.” He did not discuss actions he expects to take, the Fed said. 

The Fed chair did, however, indicate that “the path of policy will depend entirely on incoming economic information and what that means for the outlook,” the central bank added. 

He also stressed that monetary policy will support “maximum employment and stable prices,” referring to the Fed’s dual mandate of keeping unemployment and inflation low.

At a press conference earlier this month, Powell emphasized that he’s never requested a meeting with a U.S. president, and never would. 

“I wouldn’t do that,” he said. “There’s never a reason for me to ask for a meeting; it’s always been the other way.” Mr. Trump had not requested that they meet, Powell said at the time.

The meeting comes as ongoing tariff uncertainty clouds business and investment decisions. A U.S. trade court on Wednesday ruled that Mr. Trump’s broad-based tariffs are illegal. However, the president is expected to keep pushing tariffs, which are already having an inflationary effect, as retailers raise consumer prices to offset added costs they are facing. 

Mr. Trump has repeatedly called on Powell to lower interest rates and even threatened to remove him from his post, writing in an April 17 social media post that Powell’s “termination cannot come fast enough.”

Powell has previously underlined the Fed’s historical political independence, noting in December that the central bank’s job is to make decisions based on economic data without regard to the views of elected officials.