At a time when President Donald Trump is attempting to increase his authority over the central bank, Raphael Bostic, President of the Federal Reserve Bank of Atlanta, will retire at the end of his current term in February, creating a new position on the Fed’s interest-rate setting committee.
Bostic, 59, is President of one of the Fed’s 12 regional banks and a member of the 19-person committee that convenes eight times a year to choose whether to alter a crucial short-term interest rate that affects borrowing rates across the economy. At each conference, only 12 of the 19 attendees cast ballots on rates. The President of the Atlanta Fed will next cast a ballot in 2027. The regional Fed presidents alternate as voters.
The Board of Directors of the Atlanta Federal Reserve, which is composed of local business and community leaders rather than the Trump administration, will choose Bostic’s successor. All regional Fed presidents’ terms expire in 2026.
Bostic was originally appointed in June 2017 and is the first Black and openly gay President of a regional Fed bank in the Fed’s 112-year history. He recently voiced his worries that inflation is still too high for the Fed to significantly lower its key rate, and he indicated that, despite the Fed’s two rate cuts this year, he only supported one.
After acknowledging that a number of his previous financial transactions and investments had violated Fed ethics rules, Bostic revised all of his financial records dating back to 2017 in 2022. At the time, he asserted that the trades were conducted by investment managers under his direct supervision and that he was unaware of them.
The Fed’s board of governors in Washington, D.C., will decide whether to accept Bostic’s replacement. Trump has sought to expand his control over the Fed’s board, potentially increasing the administration’s influence over the selection of regional Fed presidents. Three of the seven current members of the board were appointed by Trump.
In a September essay, Bostic said that the Fed’s short-term interest rate—at that time about 4.3%—was only “marginally restrictive,” meaning that it was barely holding back the economy and it wouldn’t require many cuts to bring it to a level that would stimulate the growth.
At the same time, Bostic said he remained worried about inflation: “I will not be complacent and simply assume … another inflation outbreak won’t happen,” he said.
Bostic did not provide a reason for stepping down, but is speaking later Wednesday and could provide more details.
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