Dozens of former Fed staff sent open letters calling on the Senate to block Shelton’s nomination
A group of former Fed officials and staff, including former Vice Chairman Alan Blinder, issued an open letter on Thursday calling on the U.S. Senate to reject president Trump’s nomination of Judy Shelton to the board of Governors of the Federal Reserve. “Ms. Shelton’s views are so extreme and ill considered that they will unnecessarily interfere with the work at hand of the Federal Reserve,” the letter said The letter was also signed by two former reserve bank presidents and three former department heads. A total of 38 people have signed the letter, all of whom have served at the Federal Reserve. The Senate Banking Committee advanced Shelton’s nomination in July, and she is now waiting for full Senate approval. No confirmation vote date has been set for her and Christopher Waller, who was also nominated. Two Republican senators, Mitt Romney and Susan Collins, have said they will vote against Shelton, while Lisa Murkowski says she has not made up her mind, leaving Shelton’s fate in the air. If four Republican senators vote against her and all of them oppose her, her confirmation will be blocked. As an unofficial adviser to trump’s 2016 campaign, Shelton has been widely criticized for his far from mainstream policy views, including advocating the gold standard and possibly becoming a political loyalist to trump’s will. When she became a candidate for the board of the Federal Reserve, she seemed to have given up advocating ultra tight monetary policy and publicly agreed with the president’s call for lower interest rates.
