The Fed had once decided to partially acquiesce to Trump administration to maintain key decision-making independence

BlockBeats News, December 23rd, The Washington Post published an article titled "Federal Reserve Under Trump’s Leadership Maintains Independence Strategy," pointing out that in the spring of 2025, 12 regional Federal Reserve Bank presidents held a closed-door meeting in Philadelphia to discuss a highly sensitive topic: whether to cut about 10% of the Fed's staff in response to the Trump administration's federal government downsizing plan.

Some regional presidents opposed this, believing it could harm the Fed's operational capabilities. However, the overall outcome of the discussion was that the Fed's top management decided to partially comply with some of the Trump administration's requests to alleviate political pressure, thus better safeguarding the central bank's independence in key decisions and avoiding direct confrontation.

Subsequently, in May 2025, Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell issued an internal memo to employees announcing a plan to reduce the overall staff by about 10% over the next few years (including by the end of 2027), reducing the workforce from about 24,000 to around 22,000 people.