Latest news with #RussellVought
Yahoo
4 hours ago
- Politics
- Yahoo
Murkowski: Vought ‘disrespects' the government funding process
Sen. Lisa Murkowski (R-Alaska) on Thursday said she thinks White House budget chief Russell Vought 'disrespects' Congress's annual funding process after he said it should be 'less bipartisan.' 'I think he disrespects it,' Murkowski said. 'I think he thinks that we are irrelevant, and I wish I had actually heard the speech.' Vought drew attention Thursday for remarks he made at an event hosted by the Christian Science Monitor, at which he said 'the appropriations process has to be less bipartisan.' 'There is no voter in the country that went to the polls and said, 'I'm voting for a bipartisan appropriations process,'' he said. 'That may be the view of something that appropriators want to maintain, and I want to have very good relationships with all Republican appropriators.' As for Democratic appropriators, Vought said he's 'willing to work with' them 'if they conduct themselves with decorum.' 'I think it will lead to better results by having the appropriations process be a little bit partisan, and I don't think it's necessarily leading to a shutdown, I think we will be able to get to a good result,' he said, while criticizing how the appropriations process has been carried out in Congress thus far. He also said the power of the purse remains with Congress, but he added, 'It's a ceiling. It is not a floor. It is not the notion that you have to spend every last dollar of that.' 'Two hundred years of presidents had the ability to spend less than appropriations and did,' he argued. 'It was not only precedent, but it was a part of how the original founders understood what they were separating, the powers between the executive and the legislative branch.' Murkowski said later on Thursday that quotes she's seen in coverage of Vought's comments appear 'pretty dismissive of the appropriations process.' She was also asked about the administration's plans to send Congress additional requests for cuts to funding previously approved by lawmakers. Congress is on the verge of passing legislation that cuts roughly $9 billion in foreign aid and public broadcasting funds ahead of a looming Friday deadline. The Senate passed the rescissions package early Thursday morning, with Murkowski voting against it. 'I do not think that should be our path,' Murkowski, a senior GOP appropriator, said. 'It's not legislating. It's basically the White House saying this is what we want you to do. Take it or leave it.' Copyright 2025 Nexstar Media, Inc. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.


CNN
a day ago
- Business
- CNN
Analysis: How Trump is building a case to fire the Fed chair, explained
The Federal Reserve is an independent organization, meant to be insulated from politics, and the Supreme Court suggested this year that President Donald Trump would need a reason, or cause, to fire Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell. So Trump — who has repeatedly expressed his anger at the Fed chair for declining to lower interest rates on Trump's watch — is building one up with the help of aides. It has nothing to do with monetary policy or interest rate incompetence, but rather an over-budget renovation of the Federal Reserve complex, including the historic marble Marriner S. Eccles Building along Constitution Avenue and the National Mall in Washington, DC. The building opened in the 1930s and hadn't had a complete overhaul in the more than 90 years since then. Powell and other Fed officials took it on as a multi-step, multi-building process. As frequently happens with government building projects, the project has blown past its planned budget, with the cost skyrocketing from an initially large $1.9 billion to an eye-popping $2.5 billion. Planning got underway during Trump's first term, which is also when Trump nominated Powell to be Fed chairman. Powell has responded to the criticism and asked the Fed's inspector general to do another review of the project, but Trump's allies, notably Director of the Office of Management and Budget Russell Vought, saying that's not good enough and denying this brewing controversy is a pretext to fire Powell. In a letter Thursday, Powell refuted allegations of wrongdoing in modifications to the renovation project. 'We have taken great care to ensure the project is carefully overseen since it was first approved by the Board in 2017,' Powell wrote. Here's a look at what's going on. 'I was surprised he was appointed,' Trump said at the White House on Wednesday, either forgetting or perhaps fudging about his role in first nominating Powell as Fed chair during his first term. In the years since, as Trump turned on Powell over interest rates and Biden renominated him, prices for the renovation spiraled. Now, Trump is demanding that the Fed lower interest rates — and raising the case that Powell could be fired over the renovation, although he has said that he will not fire Powell. A common Republican talking point is that the price of the renovation, some $2.5 billion, exceeds that of the Palace of Versailles with inflation taken into account. Powell surely knows a thing or two about inflation, since he and other members of the Federal Open Market Committee have kept interest rates well above where Trump wants them in order to control inflation. Invoking the excesses of Louis XIV in pre-Revolution France is an intentional dig by Vought and others. They have pointed to plans for the building that reference garden terraces on the roof, an executive elevator that takes people to a dining level, and loads and loads of marble. Powell and the Fed have said those amenities are being taken out of context. The garden terrace on the roof is actually replacing green space on top of an underground parking garage. A green roof on the building is meant, they say, to help with stormwater and longevity, and the practice had previously been encouraged by the federal government. The executive elevator is a rehab of an existing elevator to make it usable by the disabled. The elevator itself was in place when the building first opened. Most of the marble, Powell says, will be reused from the original structure. Regardless of what's been pared back, people should expect that $2.5 billion does buy a very nice set of rehabbed buildings for the nation's central bank. There's one great irony to point out here, which is that while the effort to unseat Powell is focused on cost overruns in the redevelopment of a historic building with classical architecture, Trump has also decreed that Washington, DC, be beautified with an emphasis on classical architecture. As he put it in a memo shortly after taking office in January, 'Federal public buildings should be visually identifiable as civic buildings and respect regional, traditional, and classical architectural heritage in order to uplift and beautify public spaces and ennoble the United States and our system of self-government.' The original estimate of $1.9 billion has ballooned since 2019. What happened in between — as Powell, more than anyone in the country, can probably tell you — is that the pandemic and the government's response to it caused inflation. Building costs rose. But there are other reasons. Multiple authorities, including the National Capitol Planning Commission, asked for changes to plans. And the Fed argues it made tweaks to lower costs. Mitigating asbestos and a higher-than-expected water table also led to overruns, according to an FAQ published on the Fed's website. It's public money, but Fed funding does not come from Congress. The Fed gets most of its funds from charging interest on the securities it owns in the public interest — treasuries and mortgage-backed securities. But it is buying fewer securities and has let a lot of them fall off its balance sheet as the economy continues to emerge from the pandemic. The Fed has run a deficit in recent years. By aggressively raising interest rates to combat inflation, the Fed had to pay more to banks. The project is actually for multiple buildings that 'needed a lot of work,' as Powell told senators in June. The Fed's main Eccles building in particular, Powell said, hadn't had a serious renovation since it opened in the 1930s. 'It was not really safe, and it was not waterproof.' On its website, the Fed has posted video of water pouring into the building's basement in 2017 and asbestos abatement during the renovation. Powell bears responsibility. Before he was Fed chairman, he was the administrative governor involved in overseeing the early portions of the project. 'No one in office wants to do a major renovation of a historic building during their term,' he told the Senate Banking Committee in June. 'You much prefer to leave that to your successors and this is a great example why,' he said, referring to the current backlash. 'But we decided to take it on.' Sen. Tim Scott, who chairs the Senate Banking Committee, seized on reports from both the Wall Street Journal and the New York Post when he grilled Powell about the overruns in June. But things have gone into overdrive in July. Vought alleged in a letter he posted to X that Powell may have broken the law. Trump installed three loyalists on the National Capital Planning Commission, the federal government's planning organization for the DC region, which has some oversight of the project. One of them, Deputy White House Chief of Staff James Blair, has demanded to inspect the construction site. Vought's letter argues that Powell's June testimony in June that a roof garden terrace and an executive elevator were no longer part of the project suggests changes were made without consulting the planning commission, which approved final plans in 2021. Vought admits minor changes are allowed, but suggests the changes Powell mentioned go further than what could be allowed by law without seeking approval from the commission. Vought, before he returned to the White House with Trump, was an architect of Project 2025, the Heritage Foundation playbook to remake the US government. Project 2025 takes a counterfactual view of the Great Depression, arguing that banking regulation prolonged the downturn. Project 2025 suggested 'effectively abolishing' the Federal Reserve and returning to a pre-1913 era of banking anarchy. Trump may or may not share that view, but he does want Powell to lower interest rates. It's actually a committee of Fed bankers, led by Powell, that controls rates. Each of those bankers is appointed by the president and confirmed by the Senate. CNN's Phil Mattingly has reported that the leverage this controversy is creating is part of the point. But the Federal Reserve itself was intentionally created after a series of banking panics, and gained much more independence in successive decades to insulate it from politics. Presidents from both parties now frequently grouse about the decisions. With that context, consider the brewing controversy around the renovation of the Fed's headquarters.
Yahoo
2 days ago
- Business
- Yahoo
White House likely to send another rescissions package to Congress
White House budget chief Russell Vought said Thursday that the administration is likely to send another rescissions package to Congress to claw back previously approved spending. Vought's comments came as Republicans on Capitol Hill appeared poised to revoke $9 billion in previously approved federal funding as part of an initial package of cuts put forward by the White House. 'I don't want to get ahead of the package itself,' Vought said of a future proposal during an event hosted by the Christian Science Monitor. Vought did not provide specifics about what funds would be targeted or a timeline for when the next package would be sent to Congress, but told reporters, 'It's likely to come soon.' The administration has targeted government spending for cuts it has deemed wasteful or that does not align with the president's 'America first' agenda. 'There is still a great enthusiasm for these rescissions bills,' Vought said. The $9 billion package, which was passed by the Senate early Thursday morning and will head to the House for a final vote, targets money for global aid programs and the Corporation for Public Broadcasting, which funds National Public Radio and PBS, organizations President Trump and his allies accuse of liberal bias. The White House agreed to an amendment to remove from the package $400 million in cuts to the President's Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief global anti-AIDS initiative in the face of GOP pushback. Even as the bill is expected to reach the president's desk once it passes the GOP-controlled House, some Republicans have expressed frustration about a perceived lack of information in the White House's request. Vought pushed back on those criticisms Thursday. He argued the administration provided the same amount of detail as previous rescissions packages, laying out dollar amounts for programs the administration wanted to cut. 'People always want more detail,' Vought said. 'We provided all the detail that was needed.' Copyright 2025 Nexstar Media, Inc. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.


The Standard
2 days ago
- Business
- The Standard
What to know about Trump's effort to oust Fed Chair Powell
WASHINGTON, DC - JULY 17: The Federal Reserve building is seen as it goes under construction on July 17, 2025 in Washington, DC. U.S. President Donald Trump, who has been pressuring Federal Reserve chairman Jerome Powell to cut interest rates, says that he is "highly unlikely" to fire him. Office of Management and Budget director Russell Vought has asked the Powell to respond to a series of questions about cost overruns in the nearly $2.5 billion renovation by July 21st. Michael M. Santiago/Getty Images/AFP


CNN
2 days ago
- Business
- CNN
Powell defends $2.5 billion Fed renovation in a point-by-point response to the Trump administration
Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell responded by letter Thursday to a senior Trump administration official who accused the head of the central bank of mismanaging an 'ostentatious overhaul' of its Washington, DC, headquarters. Russell Vought, director of the Office of Management and Budget, suggested in a social media post last week that Powell had broken the law by failing to comply with government oversight regulations related to the Fed's ongoing $2.5 billion renovation, which includes the historic marble Marriner S. Eccles Building on the National Mall. 'The President is extremely troubled by your management of the Federal Reserve System,' Vought wrote in the letter he posted to social media last Thursday. 'Instead of attempting to right the Fed's fiscal ship, you have plowed ahead with an ostentatious overhaul of your Washington D.C. headquarters.' He gave Powell 'seven business days' to respond to the July 10 letter. Powell said in his response late Thursday that the renovation and its financing have always had careful oversight from the central bank's board and its own watchdog. He added that the Fed is 'not generally subject to the direction' of the National Capital Planning Commission, a body that oversees construction projects for the federal government. Powell said the Fed voluntarily opted to collaborate with the NCPC. 'We have taken great care to ensure the project is carefully overseen since it was first approved by the Board in 2017,' Powell wrote. Additionally, Powell said upgrades that were reflected in official planning documents submitted to the NCPC in 2021 were later taken out, but the Fed didn't need to resubmit paperwork because they weren't 'substantial.' The changes were instead 'intended to simplify construction and reduce the likelihood of further delays and cost increases,' Powell wrote. 'The Board does not regard any of these changes as warranting further review.' In his letter, Powell noted that both buildings needed 'significant structural repairs and other updates… including the removal of asbestos and lead contamination, complete replacement of antiquated systems such as electrical, plumbing, heating, ventilation, and air conditioning, as well as fire detection and -2- suppression systems.' The letter is similar to a FAQ posted on the Fed's website last week. Vought is one of several officials in the Trump administration to criticize the rising costs of repair and renovation work on two major buildings in the Fed complex, seemingly as a pretext to justify firing the Fed chair. Powell, who cannot be removed except 'for cause,' presides over the Fed's monetary policy committee that has been holding interest rates at current levels all year, contrary to President Donald Trump's wishes for lower borrowing costs. 'When you spend $2.5 billion on, really, a renovation, I think it's really disgraceful,' Trump told reporters this week, adding that he believes it is 'sort of' a fireable offense. He clarified on Wednesday morning that it was 'highly unlikely' that he would fire Powell — 'unless he has to leave for fraud.' Last month, Powell was asked about the central bank's renovation plans during his biannual testimony before Congress and pushed back on the assertion that he has overlooked the project's steep price tag to indulge in upscale design features. 'There's no VPI [sic] dining room. There's no new marble. We took down the old marble while putting it back up,' Powell said. 'There are no new water features. There's no beehives and there's no roof terrace gardens.' Vought's July 10 letter accused Powell of lying in his testimony. In his response Thursday, Powell clarified that some features, including new water features, had been eliminated in the years since the initial design proposal. 'These changes were intended to simplify construction and reduce the likelihood of further delays and cost increases,' Powell wrote. He clarified that while there are no 'roof terrace gardens,' a parking lot is being constructed under the building, meaning the ground-level front lawn will serve as a 'roof' for the parking structure. Marble sourced from Georgia would be used in places where the original marble structure was damaged, he said. Still, the project's cost has increased compared to earlier plans, which estimated it would cost $1.9 billion. A 2023 Fed budget document attributed some of the additional cost to 'significant increases in raw materials… higher labor costs, and changes in construction schedule expectations which lengthen use of leased space.' The Fed has previously said materials and equipment for the project have been sourced from 32 states and Washington, D.C. This story has been updated with additional developments.