The Fight Over Fed Independence Just Got Taken To a Whole New Level
Odd Lots
Bloomberg
4.5 • 2K Ratings
🗓️ 12 January 2026
⏱️ 34 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
Even before Trump's victory in 2024, it was becoming clear that the Fed would come under political pressure like never before. The first year of the new administration bore that out. Not only had Fed Chairman Jerome Powell come under tremendous pressure over interest rate policy and the cost of office renovations, Trump has tried to fire Fed Governor Lisa Cook. The Cook case will soon be argued in front of the Supreme Court, but now we have another earthquake. On Sunday night, the news broke that Powell had been served with a subpoena from the DOJ, raising the potential for criminal charges. Powell himself, who has assiduously tried to avoid the controversy, blasted the move as a form of revenge for the administration's displeasure with his interest rate policy. So where does this leave us now? On this episode, we speak with Lev Menand, a professor at Columbia Law School at the author of the Fed Unbound. He explains where things sit not with Fed independence, and why the DOJ's role here takes the fight to a whole new level.
Read more:
Dollar Drops Most in Three Weeks as Fed Gets Subpoenas
‘Sell America’ Trade Is Revived by Trump’s Latest Fed Attack
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | Markets move fast. |
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| 0:04.8 | a podcast from Barclays Investment Bank. |
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| 0:17.5 | Bloomberg Audio Studios, |
| 0:20.0 | Podcastss Radio News |
| 0:22.4 | Hello and welcome to another episode of the O'Dl Lots podcast. I'm Tracy Allaway. |
| 0:37.9 | And I'm Joe Wisenthall. |
| 0:39.2 | Joe, I feel like we're, what, about 10 days, 12 days into 2026. And how many emergency episodes have we recorded so far? |
| 0:48.9 | This is going to be our fourth. |
| 0:49.8 | Our poor producers, you know, and they keep happening on weekends, too, which is not a big, |
| 0:56.2 | the big developments keep happening on weekends. |
| 0:58.6 | But I think it's going to be a busy year for us. |
| 1:01.8 | Sad, but I am sure you are correct. |
| 1:04.2 | I mean, from the news business perspective, there's certainly no shortage of news flow, |
| 1:08.4 | and that can be a good thing. |
| 1:09.3 | But it is hard to keep up nowadays, as you mentioned. |
| 1:12.3 | I know. I want to do a Claude episode. When are we going to get around to that? |
| 1:17.0 | So this is the second weekend of 26, and the news this weekend is that Fed Chairman Jerome Powell said that the central bank has been served with a grand jury subpoena from the DOJ |
| 1:29.4 | threatening a criminal indictment. And this has to do with the renovation of a Federal Reserve |
... |
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