No country should have lower interest rates than the United States, President Donald Trump said on Sunday, days before the Federal Reserve’s next policy meeting.
Speaking to reporters at the Irish Open golf tournament at the Trump International Golf Links & Hotel in Doonbeg, County Clare, Trump said he did not know whether Fed policymakers will raise interest rates at their meeting this week. But he argued that the US “should be paying the lowest interest rate in the world” no matter what the Federal Reserve’s data indicates about inflation and the economy.
The Fed meeting will take place less than a week after a key measure of underlying inflation, the Labour Department’s Consumer Price Index, on Friday posted its largest increase in four months. That reinforced expectations that the US central bank will raise rates.
The central bank’s governors are meeting just weeks before the midterm elections that will determine whether Republicans keep their slim majorities in both chambers of the US Congress. A rate rise could add to voter concerns about affordability, according to recent Reuters/Ipsos polls.
Trump’s approval ratings have fallen as inflation has persisted. He has argued that the Fed’s interest rate levels have helped other countries at the expense of the US.
“I know more about formulas than anybody, and with the best credit in the world, we make other countries rich,” Trump said on Sunday.
The president, a frequent critic of former Fed chairman Jerome Powell, has been more supportive of Fed leadership since his own pick for chairman, Kevin Warsh, took charge earlier this year. But Trump recently has made his demands more clear.