Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell on Wednesday characterized President Donald Trump’s visit to see renovations of the central bank as “nice” as he downplayed any conflict between the pair.
In extraordinary scenes last Thursday, Powell and Trump publicly clashed over the falsely inflated cost of the building’s ongoing upgrade, with the Fed chief having to correct Trump’s bogus figures live on-air.
At a press conference Wednesday as the Fed’s twelve-member Federal Open Market Committee left interest rates unchanged, Powell was asked whether Trump’s questioning of the cost of the building’s long-planned overhaul was tied to the president’s aggressive push to get the cost of borrowing cut.
But Powell rose above the soap opera dynamics, telling a reporter it was “not for me” to comment on any link between the Fed’s renovation costs and the president’s campaign to bring down rates.
“We had a nice visit with the president,” Powell added. “It was an honor to host him. It’s not something that happens very often at the Federal Reserve, to have the president come over, let alone to visit a building. But it was a good visit.”
