President Donald Trump hosted Bahrain’s Crown Prince Salman bin Hamad Al Khalifa at the White House on Wednesday, but attention quickly shifted to Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell amid speculation that the president might fire him.
A source familiar with President Trump’s meeting with House Republicans on Tuesday confirmed to Scripps News that the president asked lawmakers what they thought about removing Powell. After the discussion, some attendees left with the impression that Powell could be fired as early as Wednesday.
A source familiar with President Trump’s meeting with House GOP holdouts yesterday CONFIRMS to @scrippsnews that POTUS asked members what they thought about firing Fed Chair Jerome Powell. Per source, after the convo, GOP left thinking that the firing was going to happen TODAY.
— Nathaniel Reed (@ReedReports) July 16, 2025
However, President Trump later said it was “highly unlikely” he would dismiss Powell, whom he appointed during his first term.
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Still, the president criticized Powell for not cutting interest rates as aggressively as President Trump would prefer.
"He's costing us a lot of money and we fight through it," President Trump said. "It's almost, the country has become so successful that it doesn't have a big impact, but it does hurt people wanting to get a mortgage, and people want to buy a house. He's a terrible fed chair
As for the presence of Bahrain’s crown prince, he is in Washington to meet with President Trump and announce a plan to invest more than $17 billion in the United States.
The investment will focus on innovation and technology, including a new agreement between Gulf Air and Boeing, and deals with Oracle and Cisco to replace Chinese-made servers.
The U.S. and Bahrain also signed a memorandum of understanding on nuclear cooperation. Secretary of State Marco Rubio called it a first step toward peaceful civil collaboration.
