Herman Cain’s withdrawal from consideration for a seat on the Federal Reserve Board has intensified the scrutiny of President Donald Trump’s other controversial choice for the central bank, economics writer Stephen Moore.
Like Cain, Moore has yet to be formally nominated for the board. His background check continues, and Trump hasn’t signaled he’s reconsidering, according to a person familiar with the matter.
Yet Trump’s chief economic adviser, Larry Kudlow, said last week that the White House is considering other candidates for both seats on the board.
Moore’s candidacy has suffered as reporters have pored through his voluminous writings, public statements and legal records. On Monday, CNN reported that Moore had written columns for the National Review more than a decade ago that derided women. Moore told the network that the columns were a “spoof.”
“Staying in despite the slime campaign,” Moore said in a text message on Monday, when asked whether he intended to remain in consideration for the Fed. He didn’t respond to inquiries Wednesday morning.
Trump has long raged at the central bank and the chairman he appointed, Jerome Powell, over its 2018 rate increases and, more recently, the Fed’s plans to gradually shrink its portfolio of billions of dollars of Treasury bonds it acquired to fight the 2008 financial crisis. One solution, from the president’s point of view, is to appoint political loyalists like Cain and Moore to counterbalance Powell.
Bank Politicization
That has caused concern over the the possible politicization of the bank, which answers to Congress and is intended to have independent control over monetary policy.
Moore is a Heritage Foundation fellow and was an economic adviser to Trump’s 2016 campaign, while Cain started a super-PAC last summer to “fight for the president’s policies and freedom agenda,” according to its website.
White House officials didn’t respond to requests for comment on Moore Tuesday and Wednesday.
Cain, in a column posted Monday on WesternJournal.com, said he was withdrawing from consideration after realizing the scale of the pay cut he’d face. His decision came four days after an Atlanta woman, Ginger White, held a news conference to resurface allegations, first made when Cain sought the 2012 Republican presidential nomination, that she’d had a 13-year extramarital affair with him.