President Donald Trump's attempted removal of Federal Reserve Governor Lisa Cook opens a new front in his months-long campaign to bring the central bank to heel on lowering interest rates. Now he's pursuing changes to the 12-member Federal Open Market Committee that casts votes to decide the cost of borrowing.

At the moment, Trump has two appointees on the Fed's seven-member Board of Governors within the FOMC sympathetic to his view that interest rates should be lower. Earlier this month, Trump named Stephen Miran, a White House economic advisor, to replace Adriana Kugler after she unexpectedly stepped down from the Board of Governors five months ahead of her term's end date. The Senate must still confirm Miran before he can take the post.

Another opening in the Board of Governors would give Trump another chance to install a loyalist or at least someone who can be persuaded to endorse lower interest rates. With four members on the panel, it delivers a majority to the president to be able to block reappointments to the FOMC early next year and reshape it as a Trump-friendly Fed.

\\"Beware an assault on independence of Fed through not reappointing Fed Bank Presidents,\\" Gene Sperling, an economist and ex-White House aide to President Joe Biden, wrote on X .

All 12 Federal Reserve Bank District presidents are up for renewal in Feb. 2026, with five of them holding a vote on changing interest rates. Jim Bianco, a financial analyst and president of Bianco Research, argued it could allow Trump an opening to expand his attacks to other Fed Bank presidents who are deemed hesitant or unwilling to support lower interest rates.

\\"It's a scenario that they could start firing bank presidents, arguably, because they're too hawkish,\\" Bianco said. \\"Bank presidents are at-will employees to the Federal Reserve Board of Governors. You can fire somebody who's an at-will employee for any reason or no reason.\\"

If so, it would bring the Fed under Trump's sway.

Trump has repeatedly assailed Powell over the Fed's pause on interest rate cuts, arguing it's akin to sabotaging the U.S. economy. He weighed firing the Fed chair, but he later backed off due to the turmoil it could unleash in financial markets.

The Fed has historically made its decisions free of political considerations and solely based on what's best for the economy. Now, Cook intends to sue the Trump administration and challenge her removal. Her attorney said in a statement that the filing lacked a legal basis.

\\"Governors are removable only through cause — something that has traditionally been understood to be very serious — so that presidents cannot simply replace them with people who will follow their every command,\\" wrote Jason Furman, a former aide to President Obama, in a New York Times op-ed . \\"Their autonomy benefits the entire country by protecting governors from political influence.\\"

Two major ratings agencies, S&P Global and Moody's Analytics, have warned this year of downgrading the U.S. AA+ credit rating if the Fed's usual independence from the executive branch was seriously jeopardized. Such a step would add to borrowing costs for the government and make it more expensive to finance U.S. debt.