Chair Powell confident that Federal Reserve can retain independence despite Trump pressures

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(28 Jan 2026) RESTRICTION SUMMARY: ++ENDS ON SOUNDBITE++ POOL Washington - 28 January 2026 1. Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell walking in for briefing 2. SOUNDBITE (English) Jerome Powell, Federal Reserve Chairman: “Not making decisions about future meetings, but we do think we're well positioned after those three cuts to let the data speak to us.” 3. Cutaway of reporter UPSOUND: “More broadly, what would happen to American households if the Federal Reserve loses its ability to operate independent from politics?” 4. SOUNDBITE (English) Jerome Powell, Federal Reserve Chairman: “So really, the point of independence is not to protect policymakers or anything like that. It just is that every advanced economy democracy in the world has come around to this common practice. It's just an institutional arrangement that is, that has served the people well. And that is to have a separation between, to not have direct elected official control over the setting of monetary policy. And the reason is that monetary policy can be used, you know, through an election cycle to affect the economy in a way that will be politically worthwhile. So this isn't, I'm not talking about the U.S. context, this is every advanced economy democracy of any size. So it's a good practice. It's pretty much everywhere among countries that look at all like the United States.” 5. Cutaway of reporter UPSOUND: “You're confident it can maintain that independence at this point. 6. SOUNDBITE (English) Jerome Powell, Federal Reserve Chairman: “Yes, I mean, I'm strongly committed to that, and so are my colleagues.” 7. Cutaway of reporter UPSOUND: “Are you concerned about AI maybe supplanting more entry-level work and entry- level jobs” 8. SOUNDBITE (English) Jerome Powell, Federal Reserve Chairman: “And we always ask, well, this is going to be different, you know, is it going to different? And we don't know. And we may, in any case, see in the short-term jobs that are being eliminated by the capabilities of AI. We may see that. We just don't what the overall effect is going be. So how to think about it in macroeconomic terms, it's very hard, you now.” 9. Cutaway of reporter UPSOUND: “Has the effects of tariffs already moved through the economy on prices?” 10. SOUNDBITE (English) Jerome Powell, Federal Reserve Chairman: “A lot of it has, so basically there are many different estimates and they're all highly uncertain, but most of the overrun in goods prices is from tariffs. And that's actually good news because if it weren't from tariffs, it might mean it's from demand and, you know, that's a harder problem to solve. We do think tariffs are likely to move through and be a one-time price increase.” 11. Cutaway, wide of reporters 12. SOUNDBITE (English) Jerome Powell, Federal Reserve Chairman: “The expectation is that we will see the effects of tariffs flowing through goods prices peaking and then starting to come down, assuming there are no new major tariff increases that are begun. And that's what we expect to see over the course of this year. If we see that, if we see, that would be something that tells us that we can loosen policy.” 13. Cutaway of reporter UPSOUND: “Two meetings left as Fed chair. You've obviously experienced a lot during your time as Fed Chair, served under multiple presidents. I'm wondering what advice you have for whoever your successor might be.” 14. SOUNDBITE (English) Jerome Powell, Federal Reserve Chairman: ++ENDS ON SOUNDBITE++ STORYLINE: Fed officials met this week in the shadow of unprecedented pressure from the Trump White House. Find out more about AP Archive: http://www.aparchive.com/HowWeWork Twitter: https://twitter.com/AP_Archive Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/APArchives ​​ Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/APNews/ You can license this story through AP Archive: http://www.aparchive.com/metadata/youtube/0194f90eeabe48f5b16d577a26cf1ea8