This is John Batchel, a conversation with my colleague Elizabeth Peake about the Federal Reserve

and the allegation or the investigation of an allegation that Chairman of the Federal Reserve,

Jerome Powell, misled, deceived, lied to Congress about the costs of the building that's going on at the Federal Reserve.

It was very clearly who names this as not important.

A red herring.

Why?

What's behind it is the compelling debate.

The independence of the Federal Reserve, not only now but in future,

especially the choice that the President may make again in the springtime and independence.

Is Elizabethique to explain the red herring?

More of this tonight.

Well, President Trump affects to have no involvement in this, but the Department of Justice

is investigating Jay Powell

for this monster construction of a new building, which is way, way over budget, like $700 million

over budget, and which some people accused Powell of having lied about before Congress.

I think this is an absolute unforced error by the Trump

administration. Ninety-nine percent of Americans expect federal projects to go way over budgets.

They don't really expect officials to be particularly truthful speaking to Congress, and frankly,

they don't care whether Jay Powell did that or not.

That's my take. I could be wrong. I don't think this is an important or sensible political

target. I think President Trump is doing too many things at once. I don't know whether he was

involved in this or not, but I think this is total red herring.

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