Senate Republicans have sunk Trump's last four Federal Reserve choices. But Judy Shelton is far from a lock.
By Tory Newmyer
February 7 at 7:34 AM
Senate Republicans just proved they will defend President Trump against an existential threat to his power. Next week will test whether they stand with him as he attempts to exert that power on a key economic personnel decision.
The president has gone an ignominious zero-for-four on winning Senate confirmation of his most recent picks for the Federal Reserve Board. His latest controversial pick, Judy Shelton, will face a trial by fire Thursday when she takes questions from Republicans on the Senate Banking Committee.
“Her hearing performance could make or break her confirmation,” my colleagues Heather Long and Erica Werner write in a preview that turned up some skeptical GOPers on the panel.
Shelton — whose nomination the White House paired with Christopher Waller, an economist for the St. Louis Fed considered a lock for confirmation — has a history of expressing policy views outside the mainstream. While she has met with some with senators, the pressure will be on to sand off the rough edges when she appears before the committee.
Shelton has advocated a return to something like the gold standard, for example. And she has questioned the need for the Fed to maintain its independence from the White House,
a particularly fraught matter given the pressure Trump has sought to impose on the central bank. She has also flip-flopped on interest rate policy, decrying rates as too low during the aftermath of the financial crisis in the Obama era, then calling them too high recently, tracking with Trump’s own movable standard.
Those issues have gathered the most public attention, yet Heather and Erica report
Shelton has alarmed banking interests with her call “to end federal deposit insurance that currently ensures Americans’ deposits of up to $250,000 at banks. And her recent questioning of the Fed’s overnight borrowing market, referred to as repo operations, which is a critical way the Fed keeps cash flowing through the financial system.”
The Republicans’ razor-thin 13-12 majority on the banking panel, and likely unified Democratic opposition to Shelton’s nomination, gives her no margin for losing GOP votes and winning committee approval. And Shelton has work to do putting Republican misgivings to rest. “There are a lot of questions about her," Sen. Richard C. Shelby (R-Ala.), a senior member of the panel, tells Heather and Erica. “I have a few, but I’m not the only one.”
As they note, Sen. Patrick Toomey (R-Pa.), another top committee Republican, has voiced consternation about the prospect of moving back to the gold standard.
more:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/news/powerpost/paloma/the-finance-202/2020/02/07/the-finance-202-senate-republicans-have-sunk-trump-s-last-four-federal-reserve-choices-but-judy-shelton-is-far-from-a-lock/5e3c882888e0fa405587cd45/
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