Sen. Thom Tillis said he will support Kevin Warsh after the DOJ dropped its criminal probe of outgoing Fed Chair Jerome Powell
Sen. Thom Tillis said Sunday that he would end his blockade of Federal Reserve chair nominee Kevin Warsh, clearing the way for a Senate confirmation vote after the Justice Department dropped its criminal investigation of outgoing Fed Chair Jerome Powell.
"I am prepared to move on with the confirmation of Mr. Warsh. I think he's going to be a great Fed chair," Tillis, a North Carolina Republican, said on NBC's "Meet the Press."
A committee vote on Warsh's nomination is set for Wednesday, with the full Senate potentially weighing in soon after. Democrats on the banking panel are unanimously opposed, but Tillis' backing gives Republicans all 13 of their votes — enough to push the nomination through.
Tillis had made his support contingent on the DOJ shutting down its probe of Powell — an inquiry focused on whether Powell mismanaged a $2.5 billion project to renovate a pair of Fed properties in the nation's capital. On Friday, Pirro said the probe would be handed off to the Fed's own inspector general. After speaking with DOJ officials, Tillis said he came away satisfied that any future criminal action would require the inspector general to make a formal referral first, he told Reuters.
"If we had allowed this (investigation) to occur, I think it would have had devastating consequences for our financial systems and the markets worldwide," Tillis said in a statement Sunday.
Separately, Pirro intends to move forward with a challenge to a federal judge's ruling that threw out subpoenas directed at the Fed. Tillis posted on social media Sunday that he had been assured the appeal was about establishing broader legal precedent, not about reviving subpoenas against the central bank.
Powell's chairmanship ends May 15, leaving roughly three weeks for the Senate to act — one of which is a scheduled recess. CNN noted that history offers little reassurance: the Senate has managed to confirm a Fed chair nominee within that kind of window only a single time.
At his hearing earlier this week, Warsh — who served on the Fed's board between 2006 and 2011 — called for a sweeping overhaul of the institution, using the phrase "regime change" to describe his ambitions for revamping everything from its inflation yardsticks to its public messaging. Should he be confirmed, Powell would have the option of staying on as a board governor, a position he could hold until January 2028.
Trump has long pushed for lower borrowing costs and at times suggested he might seek to oust Powell over his reluctance to cut rates. The president has made clear he wants Warsh to reduce rates once in office — going so far as to joke that he would take legal action against his own nominee if he failed to deliver.
