The National Economic Council chief Kevin Hassett is suddenly the name to beat in the race to replace Jerome Powell at the Federal Reserve. Prediction markets are leaning his way; President Donald Trump cheekily hinted that he “knows who he’s going to pick”; and the White House said it is aiming for a Christmas reveal. But among the economists and former colleagues who’ve known him for years, reactions range from enthusiastic to deeply uneasy.
To his supporters, Hassett is a brilliant policy architect and, as longtime ally and former Trump advisor Stephen Moore puts it, a “hard money guy” who will defend the dollar. To some of his former peers, however, he has morphed into something far more concerning as an advisor to the president: a political loyalist willing to sacrifice institutional independence—and objective truth—to please his boss.
Hassett has become a regular presence on cable news, defending Trump’s policy priorities, downplaying unfavorable data, and echoing the White House line on everything from inflation to the legitimacy of federal statistics. Earlier in November, the NEC director insisted that inflation had “come way down” and that the price trajectory was “really, really good,” even as official data showed that the consumer price index had increased for five consecutive months.
