The chair of the Federal Housing Finance Agency, Fannie and Freddie has spent the past day calling on Powell to step down, saying he’s responsible for high home prices.
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The chair of the Federal Housing Finance Agency (FHFA) is in an outright war against Jerome Powell, chair of the Federal Reserve, saying he is responsible for housing unaffordability and demanding that he resign.
Bill Pulte took to the social media platform X as well as national cable TV to call for Powell’s resignation in the days after the Federal Reserve opted to hold rates steady — a decision it made earlier this week. Pulte blamed Powell for keeping interest rates high.
“Jerome Powell is a main reason for the Housing Supply Crisis in this Country,” Pulte wrote Thursday in one of several X posts on the topic. “By improperly keeping interest rates high, Jerome Powell is trapping homeowners in low-rate mortgages and choking off existing home sale — directly fueling the housing supply crisis. He must lower rates.”
Pulte and President Donald Trump have both been putting pressure on Powell — who was appointed to the chair position in 2018 during Trump’s first term in office — to lower the federal funds rate. The federal funds rate can indirectly impact mortgage rates, automobile loans and credit card rates.
Powell’s term ends in May 2026. Pulte took to Fox News to spread his message on Friday morning, saying that Powell should either lower rates before the end of his term or resign.
“Peoples’ mortgage affordability has been crushed in the last four years,” Pulte said. “People have to pay double what they had to pay compared to President Trump’s first term in order to buy a home.”
Pulte said that Powell was “one of if not the biggest reason for the housing supply crisis that we have in this country.”
“It’s hurting Americans right now. Nobody wants to sell their existing homes,” he said. We need to get that inventory churning in this country again.”
Pulte didn’t answer when asked if he had heard from Powell since calling for his resignation.
Trump took to his Truth Social platform to share Pulte’s message.
“Too Late—Powell is the WORST. A real dummy, who’s costing America $Billion!” Trump wrote. In a separate message he wrote that the federal funds rate should be 2.5 points lower than it is.
The Federal Reserve began quickly raising the federal funds rate in March 2022 to combat high inflation and an overheated labor market. It stopped raising the rate in August 2023 and implemented a brief series of cuts in September 2024 but has not cut them since Trump’s second inauguration.
The board has continued to express caution, saying it was waiting to see the impact of Trump’s tariff policy before moving to lower rates.
Powell said this week that he expects a “meaningful amount of inflation” to arrive in the coming months.
“We have to take that into account,” Powell said.
“Increases in tariffs this year are likely to push up prices and weigh on economic activity,” Powell said. “The effects on inflation could be short-lived, reflecting a one-time shift in the price level. It’s also possible that the inflationary effects could be more persistent.”
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