Warsh Puts His Stamp on Atlanta Fed President Search
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- Kevin Warsh paused the Atlanta Fed president search that was underway under then-Chair Jerome Powell so he could oversee the appointment himself, with former deputy Treasury Secretary Michael Faulkender subsequently considered for the role.
- Michael Faulkender served as deputy Treasury secretary from March to August 2025 and resigned after Trump soured on him, per the Wall Street Journal; he is now a finance professor at the University of Maryland and briefly served as acting IRS commissioner.
- The Atlanta Fed presidency has been open since February, when Raphael Bostic stepped down at the end of his term — making him the first African American to lead a regional bank when he took the job in 2017 — with Cheryl Venable currently serving as interim president.
- Warsh announced five task forces staffed entirely by outside experts, with no current Fed governors or regional presidents included, to study overhauls in rate-setting, balance sheet policy, communications, and the data the Fed uses to gauge the economy.
- At his first FOMC meeting, Warsh defied analyst expectations with a hawkish press conference that pushed markets to raise their interest rate projections, signaling an early effort to demonstrate independence from the White House.
- Three other regional Fed presidents — John Williams of New York, Mary Daly of San Francisco, and Tom Barkin of Richmond — are up for replacement in 2028, and CNBC reports a quiet campaign is already underway to line up a successor for Williams, who holds a permanent FOMC vote.
- Jerome Powell warned in his final press conference that removing regional presidents for their policy views would be "the beginning of the end" of Fed independence; Warsh said at his confirmation hearing that his promised "regime change" does not include replacing regional bank presidents.
Why it matters: The Atlanta appointment is Warsh's first opportunity to shape FOMC personnel, and the reported candidacy of Faulkender — a former Trump Treasury official who resigned after the president soured on him — turns the pick into a loyalty-versus-independence litmus test. With three more regional president seats (including the permanent-vote New York role) opening by 2028, the FOMC Warsh assembles over the next two years will define rate-setting well beyond his own tenure.
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