Four people close to the Federal Reserve chair selection process say that the president is not going to nominate Federal Reserve Chair Janet Yellen for a second term, according to a report from Politico. The sources said that current National Economic Council Director Gary Cohn is the leading candidate to replace the current Fed chair.
“It’s Gary’s if he wants it, and I think he wants it,” one of the sources said. While another said Cohn would be easily confirmed.
The nomination would be sure to spark outrage among economic nationalists in the White House, however, who are critical of Cohn’s Democratic background and support for free trade. Progressives have also been consistently critical of Trump’s appointments of Goldman Sachs alums to run economic policy. Cohn would be the first non-economist Fed chair in four decades.