Jerome Powell says the criminal investigation centers on a June Senate hearing, where he got into a heated exchange over the Fed’s renovation plans.
In an extraordinary video Sunday night, Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell said he had been served with grand jury subpoenas as part of a criminal investigation into his testimony about the Fed’s Washington, DC, headquarters.
While much has been made over whether the probe is a pretext for President Donald Trump to remove Powell as Fed chairman, far less attention has been paid to what Powell actually said in the June Senate testimony that sparked the Justice Department investigation.
While criminal probes and grand jury hearings are tightly guarded secrets, here is what we know so far:
At the June hearing, Powell got into a heated exchange with Sen. Tim Scott, the Republican chair of the Senate banking committee, who criticized the Federal Reserve for « lavish renovations » of its main offices.
Powell’s responses to Scott’s questions prompted one of Trump’s allies in the House of Representatives to send a criminal referral to the Justice Department, accusing Powell of perjury.
In one of the statements singled out by Rep. Anna Paulina Luna as potentially perjurious, Powell said one of the Federal Reserve’s buildings never had a « serious » renovation. Luna said the building was renovated between 1999 and 2003.
Luna also accused Powell of making a false statement during an exchange with Scott when Powell denied the Federal Reserve would implement some of the more opulent-sounding features it had previously planned.
At the Senate hearing, Scott pressed Powell with questions about a planning document that said the central bank’s historic Marriner S. Eccles building would install « rooftop garden terraces » and « ornate water features », as well as new elevators for board members to take to a « VIP dining suite. »
Powell dismissed Scott’s comments about the project as « flatly misleading. »
The Eccles building had been using the same elevator since the building was built in the 1930s, he said. Other issues Scott raised were « no longer in the plans », Powell told him.
