US Federal Reserve chairman Jerome Powell on Wednesday said the current Supreme Court case involving embattled official Lisa Cook is the most important in the central bank’s history.
Mr Powell attended last week’s Supreme Court hearing, during which justices appeared deeply reluctant to allow US President Donald Trump to fire Ms Cook. The case is regarded as a broader test of the US central bank’s independence, which has been under immense pressure from the Trump administration to lower interest rates.
No Fed official in the central bank’s history has ever been fired, and analysts say that should justices rule in favour of Mr Trump, it could open the door for other Fed officials to be fired in the future.
“That case is perhaps the most important legal case in the Fed’s 113-year history and … it might be hard to explain why I didn’t attend,” Mr Powell told reporters.
He is under criminal investigation by the Trump administration over remarks he made before the US Senate last year concerning the central bank’s renovation project. The Fed chairman has called the investigation a “pretext” to pressure the central bank to lower interest rates.
Mr Powell refused to answer questions on the investigation, and did not answer when asked by reporters if the Fed responded to subpoenas it received this month.
He also did not say if he will serve the remaining two years on the Fed when his term as chairman expires in May.
“There’s a time and place but not something I’m going to get into today,” he said.