Biden nominates 3 for Fed board, including first Black woman [View all]
Source: AP
By CHRISTOPHER RUGABER
WASHINGTON (AP) President Joe Biden on Friday announced the nominations of three people for the Federal Reserves Board of Governors, including Sarah Bloom Raskin, a former Fed and Treasury official, for the top regulatory slot and Lisa Cook, who would be the first Black woman to serve on the Feds board.
Biden also nominated Phillip Jefferson, an economist, dean of faculty at Davidson College in North Carolina and a former Fed researcher. The three nominees, who will have to be confirmed by the Senate, would fill out the Feds seven-member board.
They would join the Fed at a particularly challenging time in which the central bank will undertake the delicate task of raising its benchmark interest rate to try to curb high inflation, without undercutting the recovery from the pandemic recession. On Wednesday, the government reported that inflation reached a four-decade high in December.
If approved, Bidens picks would significantly increase the Feds diversity. Cook and Jefferson would be just the fourth and fifth Black governors in the Feds 108-year history. And for the first time, a majority of the board would consist of female appointees.
FILE - U.S. Deputy Treasury Secretary Sarah Bloom Raskin is shown before the opening ceremony of the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) finance ministers meeting at the Diaoyutai State Guesthouse in Beijing, China on Oct. 22, 2014. President Joe Biden has forwarded three nominations to the Senate for the Federal Reserve's Board of Governors, including former Fed official Sarah Bloom Raskin for the top regulatory slot, and Lisa Cook, who would be the first Black woman to serve as a governor. Biden is also nominating Phillip Jefferson, an economist, dean of faculty at Davidson College in North Carolina, and a former Fed researcher. (AP Photo/Andy Wong, File)
Read more: https://apnews.com/article/joe-biden-business-race-and-ethnicity-inflation-1443957d03e1c0eb3470e1c38f5956f5