President Trump criticized Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell for hiking up interest rates and lamented former President Obama’s “zero interest” rates in an interview with The Wall Street Journal. Trump claimed that Powell “almost looks like he’s happy raising interest rates” and said “maybe” he regretted nominating him as the Fed’s chairman—but it was “too early to tell.” “To me the Fed is the biggest risk [to the economy], because I think interest rates are being raised too quickly,” Trump told the newspaper. “I’m just saying this: I’m very unhappy with the Fed because Obama had zero interest rates.” The president reportedly remarked in the Tuesday interview that Obama’s growth record was skewed because of the low interest rates in the post-Great Recession economy. The Fed raised the rate three times this year to the 2 percent and 2.25 percent range, and is expected to raise it a fourth time at its December meeting. Trump additionally said he was “using tariffs to negotiate” and described the tariffs on aluminum and steel he imposed this year as “small.” Trump told the newspaper his former personal attorney Michel Cohen was “like a public relations person” who “represented [him] on very small things.” He also said the recording Cohen made of a conversation they had about former Playboy model Karen McDougal was “meaningless.” “It’s unthinkable that a lawyer would tape a client, that a lawyer would make statements,” he said. “He shouldn’t do that. I’m surprised that he did it.”
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