Inflation

The Federal Reserve faces a choice it does not want to make. Tariffs push prices higher while political pressure demands lower rates. A central bank that ignores this collision risks losing both its credibility and its independence.

The Federal Reserve can raise rates and shrink its balance sheet, but it cannot make Congress stop borrowing. Until lawmakers cap spending, inflation will remain a political tax and the dollar will keep losing ground.

The across-the-board tariffs pushed in 2025 and 2026 are raising prices on cars, appliances, and construction materials. Free trade is not the enemy of American workers; hidden taxes disguised as patriotism are.

The Federal Reserve faces mounting pressure to justify its 2026 rate posture as inflation hovers above its 2 percent target and political demands for lower borrowing costs intensify. Independence requires accountability, not silence.

The Federal Reserve should hold interest rates steady through the summer because core inflation remains above 2.5 percent and premature easing risks repeating the policy mistakes of the 1970s. Patience now protects purchasing power later.

The Federal Reserve has stopped warning that sweeping tariffs will push consumer prices higher. That silence suggests political pressure is now shaping monetary messaging more than price stability.

The Bureau of Labor Statistics reported 172,000 new jobs in May and a 4.3 percent unemployment rate. Average hourly earnings rose 3.4 percent year over year. With tariff uncertainty still ahead, the Federal Reserve should keep interest rates steady rather than cut prematurely.

Working families still face grocery bills up sharply since 2021 and rents that outpace wages, even as illegal crossings fall. Washington should stop celebrating border optics and start cutting the spending and regulatory burdens crushing Hispanic and blue-collar households.

The Federal Reserve held rates at 4.25% in May 2026, and both parties treated the decision as a campaign weapon. Voters care more about grocery prices than central bank independence, so monetary policy is raw campaign material. Politicians will pay for ignoring that reality.

The House passed the Federal Reserve Accountability Act on May 28, 2026, by a vote of 218 to 211, requiring Government Accountability Office audits of monetary policy decisions and new limits on the central bank's emergency lending powers.

The Federal Reserve's warnings on inflation and rate policy no longer carry weight with traders. William Harcourt III argues that markets are ignoring the central bank's deteriorating credibility at their own peril.

Kevin Warsh's leadership at the Federal Reserve has made monetary policy the defining force in American politics, with interest rate decisions shaping household budgets, elections, and the nation's fiscal future more than any campaign promise ever could.

Inflation is cooling, but a 50-basis-point rate cut would risk reigniting price pressures and politicizing the Federal Reserve at the worst possible moment.

The Consumer Price Index rose 3.8 percent year-over-year in April, resisting Federal Reserve expectations for continued disinflation. Sticky core inflation in services suggests the Fed's rate-cutting window may be narrower than previously signaled.

The May 2026 FOMC statement was, in plain reading, an admission that the inflation glide path the Committee projected in November is no longer the working model. The market priced it accordingly. The political class did not.

The headline CPI number understates the experience of households earning between $60,000 and $120,000 a year. The basket the CPI measures is not the basket those households consume.