Kevin Warsh, President Donald Trump’s nominee to chair the Federal Reserve, testifies during the confirmation hearing of the Senate Banking, Housing and Urban Affairs Committee at the Dirksen Senate Office Building on April 21, 2026 in Washington, D.C. (Photo by Andrew Harnik/Getty Images)
WASHINGTON — President Donald Trump’s pick to lead the Federal Reserve, Kevin Warsh, promised Tuesday that the central bank would remain “strictly independent” if confirmed to the top spot, even as the president announced his demand for the up-to-date Fed chairman to lower interest rates.
Warsh, a former Fed board governor, faced questions during his confirmation hearing before the U.S. Senate Committee on Banking, Housing and Urban Affairs as the term of current Fed Chairman Jerome Powell, who is in Trump’s crosshairs, ends.
Trump’s criminal probe in Powell, a more than $2.5 billion Fed office renovation project, stands in the way of Warsh’s confirmation in a closely divided committee.
Sen. Thom Tillis, R-N.C., maintains he will vote against Warsh’s nomination until Trump orders federal prosecutors to halt a “bogus” investigation into one of his most high-profile political enemies.
The Senate Banking Committee is composed of 13 Republicans in the majority and 11 Democrats in the minority. All Democrats plan to oppose the nomination, and in Tillis’ case, a tie vote means Warsh’s nomination will not advance to the full Senate.
The top Democrat on the committee, Sen. Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts, charged that Trump wants to install a “sock puppet” and “use monetary policy to artificially pressure the economy in the short term, and this is his last chance to do so before the November election.”
Instead of questioning Warsh, Tillis showed a series of photos and numbers illustrating “unfortunate but reasonable” cost overruns at the Federal Reserve headquarters in Washington.
“If we put in prison every member of the federal government that has over budgeted, we would have to set aside an area about the size of Texas as a penal colony,” Tillis said. “…Let’s get rid of this investigation so I can support your nomination.”
Court action
Last month, U.S. District Court Judge James Boasberg for the District of Columbia blocked calls for the administration to investigate the central bank and Powell, pointing to a “mountain of evidence” that Trump is using the investigation to force Powell to lower interest rates or resign.
Despite this, the president did not back down. According to them, a week before Tuesday’s hearing, two investigators from the office of Jeanine Pirro, an American lawyer in the District of Columbia, showed up unannounced at the Fed construction site. details reported the New York Times.
According to Boasberg, more than 100 times orderTrump and his allies issued public statements ridiculing Powell and threatening to fire him unless interest rates were lowered.
Powell’s term expires on May 15. During Powell’s recent press conference he said plans to remain, under Fed rules, as chairman pro tempore until his successor is confirmed.
If Powell stays, ‘then I’ll have to fire him’ – Trump he said Fox Business hosted by Maria Bartiromo on April 15.
A battle-tested choice.
While Trump’s clash with Powell overshadowed Warsh’s nomination hearing, Republicans largely praised the former board governor, who served from 2006 to 2011.
Senate Banking Chairman Tim Scott, R-S.C., said Warsh was “battle-tested” after helping lead the central bank during the 2008 financial crisis.
“In his first term as governor, he helped our economy through the crisis and restored faith in the economy,” Scott said.
But Democrats question Warsh’s ability to remain independent from Trump’s demands, especially as the president must justify higher costs from tariffs and the war with Iran ahead of the 2026 midterm elections, when voters are expected to focus largely on affordability issues.
Sen. Andy Kim, D-N.J., asked Warsh: “Do you agree that American families are struggling with affordability issues right now?”
Warsh, placing the blame largely on monetary policy decisions under President Joe Biden in the wake of the Covid-19 pandemic, said the Fed bears “some responsibility for the things you described and for the fact that the legacy of inflation, which I think is the biggest economic policy mistake in 40 to 50 years, happened just a few years ago and we’re still living with the remnants of that. I think inflation is less problematic than it was a few years ago.”
When pressed by Kim on whether the Fed should be concerned about soaring fuel and fertilizer costs amid Trump’s ongoing war in Iran, Warsh said: “Senator, if my reform agenda, if confirmed, means anything, it will be the job of the central bank, and especially the Fed chairman, to stay the course.”
Lisa Cook’s firing
Warren and Sen. Angela Alsobrooks, D-Maryland, also cited Trump’s contested August 2025 firing of Federal Reserve Gov. Lisa Cook, now before the U.S. Supreme Court.
Supreme Court oral arguments in January, it attracted a high-profile performance by Powell. Trump accused Cook of financial fraud, but even conservative Supreme Court justices questioned his argument for firing her.
“Will you dedicate yourself to defending Governor Cook’s term as Chairman Powell did?” Alsobrooks asked.
“Senator, it was a pleasure meeting you in your office and spending time with you. As I said then, and I will repeat to the broader committee: If I am in favor of anything, the Fed should remain in office. As I understand it, the case is pending before the United States Supreme Court,” Warsh said.
In his opening statement, Warsh defended the president’s right to share his views on interest rates, but on Tuesday he repeatedly told Democratic lawmakers that Trump had not asked him to make any commitments.
Continuing Warsh’s response earlier in the hearing, Alsobrooks asked: “You said you have never – you used the word ‘specifically’ – asked you to lower your interest rates.” Did the president also suggest this to you in general?”
“I wasn’t trying to be smart. The president never briefed me broadly or specifically or suggested that I should decide on any interest rate path at all,” Warsh said.
