By Dropping Her Criminal Probe of Jerome Powell, Jeanine Pirro Confirms Its Political Motivation

“This investigation continues,” Jeanine Pirro, the U.S. attorney for the District of Columbia, declared last Wednesday, referring to the criminal probe of Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell that she launched in November. “I am going forward. We are appealing the decision of Judge Boasberg.”

Pirro was referring to a March 11 ruling in which James Boasberg, chief judge of the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia, quashed two grand jury subpoenas seeking information about the over-budget renovation of the central bank’s Washington, D.C., headquarters and Powell’s allegedly dishonest testimony about that project during a Senate Banking Committee hearing on June 25. But on Friday, two days after saying she was determined to continue her probe of Powell, Pirro announced that she was dropping it.

It is not hard to see why. Boasberg concluded that the investigation was a transparent attempt to intimidate Powell, whom President Donald Trump has long criticized for failing to deliver the interest-rate cuts he wanted. Sen. Thom Tillis (R–N.C.), a member of the Senate Banking Committee, agreed with that assessment. Tillis had vowed to block confirmation of Trump’s nominee to replace Powell as Fed chairman, Kevin Warsh, until the Justice Department “drops their bogus investigation into Chairman Powell,” which he said “threatens the independence of the Fed.”

Pirro’s investigation of Powell was another example of Trump’s efforts to punish his enemies by weaponizing the criminal justice system. That pattern includes Pirro’s attempt to prosecute members of Congress for constitutionally protected speech and the dismissed indictments against former FBI Director James Comey and New York Attorney General Letitia James. The aborted case against Powell is especially striking because even Republicans who are critical of his performance as Fed chairman agreed there was no evidence that he had broken the law.

The central allegation against Powell was that he lied when he told the Senate Banking Committee that the Fed headquarters renovation did not include luxurious features that had been described in press reports. In a June 24 letter to Powell, several members of the committee asked him about amenities such as “rooftop garden terraces, ornate water features, new elevators that drop board members off directly in their VIP dining suite, use of white marble, rooftop Italian beehives, and a private art collection in the basement.” During his testimony the next day, Powell tried to set the record straight.

“There’s no VIP dining room,” Powell said. “There’s no new marble. We took down the old marble and are putting it back up. We will have to use new marble where some of the old marble broke, but there are no special elevators. They are old elevators that have been there. There are no new water features. There are no beehives, and there are no roof terrace gardens. All of the sort of inflammatory things that the media carried are either not in the current plan or are simply inaccurate.”

That testimony, Powell’s foes argued, contradicted plans that had been approved by the National Capital Planning Commission in 2021. But Powell said any perceived discrepancies were based either on mischaracterizations or on elements that had been abandoned since 2021.

The “garden terrace” mentioned in the 2021 plans, Powell said in a July 17 letter to Office of Management and Budget Director Russell Vought, referred to “the ground-level front lawn of the 1951 Constitution Avenue building,” which “serves as the roof of the parking structure beneath.” Such “green roofs,” he explained, “are commonly used to help with stormwater management and to increase building efficiency and roof longevity.”

Powell reiterated that “there are no VIP dining rooms being constructed as part of the project.” Rather, he said, “the Eccles Building has historic multi-use rooms on the 4th Floor that are used as conference rooms and for mealtime meetings,” and those preexisting rooms “are being renovated and preserved.”

Powell also reiterated that “there are no special, private, or VIP elevators being constructed as part of the project.” Rather, he said, “the original elevators of the Eccles Building are being rehabilitated, including an elevator that services historic conference rooms.” He added that “a short (eighteen-inch) extension of rehabilitated elevator will make the space more accessible for people with disabilities.”

Although the initial design “included new water features for the 1951 Constitution
Avenue building,” Powell wrote, “they have been eliminated.” Instead, “fountains that were original to the Eccles building are being restored.”

What about the marble? “The Eccles and 1951 Constitution Avenue Buildings were originally built with marble in the facades and stonework,” Powell told Vought. “The project has salvaged the original exterior marble to be reinstalled and will use new domestic marble sourced from Georgia in places where the original was damaged or where needed to keep with historic preservation guidelines and to address concerns raised by external review agencies.”

Whatever you make of those explanations, Powell’s testimony certainly does not seem like a violation of 18 USC 1001, which prohibits “knowingly and willfully” making “any materially false, fictitious, or fraudulent statement or representation” during congressional testimony. As Tillis noted on the Senate floor in February, he did not think Powell had deliberately misled the Senate Banking Committee, and neither did most of the other Republicans on the panel.

“I found him to be inept at doing his job, but ineptness or being incompetent is not a
criminal act,” Sen. Tim Scott (R–S.C.), the committee’s chairman, said in February. “I do not believe that he committed a crime during the hearing.”

Sen. Dave McCormick (R–Pa.) concurred. “I believe strongly in an independent Federal Reserve,” he said in January. “I also agree with President Trump that Chairman Powell has been slow to cut interest rates. I think the Federal Reserve renovation may well have wasted taxpayer dollars, but the proper place to fix this is through congressional oversight. I do not think Chairman Powell is guilty of criminal activity.”

Sen. Kevin Cramer (R–N.D.) took a similar view, criticizing the project’s cost overruns but adding: “I do not believe, however, he is a criminal. I ⁠hope this criminal investigation can be put to rest quickly along with the remainder of Jerome Powell’s term. We need to restore confidence in the Fed.” Sen. Mike Crapo (R–Idaho) likewise said he wanted “this resolved as quickly as possible,” adding that it is important for the central bank to remain “free of political influence.”

Sen. John Kennedy (R–La.) also was skeptical of Pirro’s investigation. “We need this like we need a hole in the head,” he said in January. “I know Chairman Powell very well. I will be stunned—I will be shocked if he has done anything wrong.” Sen. Cynthia Lummis (R–Wyo.), a prominent Powell critic, likewise “said [that] the Justice Department’s use of a criminal statute looked like a ‘heavy lift’ and that she did not see any criminal intent,” Reuters reported around the same time.

“We don’t think a crime was committed,” Tillis said after citing those comments, and “we are the majority of the Republicans on the Banking Committee.” That assessment, he said, “sends a very clear message” to Pirro: “Why don’t you come talk to people who were at the alleged scene of the crime? We said we do not believe there was any criminal intent.”

Pirro’s retreat confirms that she has no evidence to the contrary. Even when Boasberg invited her to substantiate her suspicions with ex parte evidence that only he would see, she had nothing to offer. “I will not hesitate to restart a criminal investigation ​should the facts warrant doing so,” Pirro said on Friday, implicitly conceding that “the facts” did not justify the probe she had promised to continue just two days earlier.

“The investigation still continues,” Pirro lamely insisted. “It’s just under a different authority.”

Pirro was referring to an investigation of the renovation project by the Federal Reserve’s inspector general, which Powell himself requested. Although she implied that the inspector general’s review is pretty much the same as her criminal investigation, that is obviously not true. While the inspector general’s report may identify failures that unnecessarily boosted the project’s cost, that is a far cry from alleging criminal conduct.

When Boasberg quashed Pirro’s subpoenas, he noted that Trump or his underlings had made “at least 100 statements” criticizing Powell’s performance and “pressuring
him to lower interest rates.” In a characteristic Truth Social post, Trump described Powell as “TOO ANGRY, TOO STUPID, & TOO POLITICAL” to “have the job of Fed Chair,” saying “he is costing our Country TRILLIONS OF DOLLARS.” Powell is “a TOTAL LOSER,” he said, “and our Country is paying the price!” If Powell did not fall in line, Trump said, “I may have to force something.”

In that context, Boasberg concluded, Pirro’s investigation looked like an attempt to criminalize a policy disagreement. “There is abundant evidence that the subpoenas’ dominant (if not sole) purpose is to harass and pressure Powell either to yield to the President or to resign and make way for a Fed Chair who will,” he wrote. “The Government has offered no evidence whatsoever that Powell committed any crime other than displeasing the President.”

Even as he condemned Boasberg’s ruling, Trump confirmed the judge’s conclusion that the Powell investigation was politically motivated. Trump emphasized Powell’s “horrible performance” in setting interest rates, a policy critique that has nothing to do with the legal merits of pursuing a criminal case against him.

Although Trump frequently complains about Democratic “weaponization” of the legal system, Tillis warned, he is engaged in similar abuses. Whether it happens under a Democratic administration or a Republican administration, “vindictive prosecution is wrong, period,” Tillis said. “At some point, one of the two parties has to stand on principle and end this cycle, or it gets worse.”