Senate Republicans Defend Fed Rate Hike and Supreme Court Ballot Ruling Against Trump's Attacks

Since the Federal Reserve raised its benchmark rate to a range of 3.75% to 4% on Wednesday, September 16, the political blowback has spread well past the central bank. President Trump has spent the week attacking two institutions he doesn't control, the Fed and the Supreme Court, and his own party's senators are refusing to back him on either fight.

The Fed fight

Trump wants rates at 1% or lower, calling the United States the "Best Credit in the World, BY FAR" and demanding the Fed "LOWER THE INTEREST RATES ... AND FAST!" according to The Hill. He told reporters he's "relying on Kevin," referring to Fed Chair Kevin Warsh, his own pick for the job, but said Warsh faces a "very hostile" and "very political" board that outvoted him.

Republican senators aren't buying the framing. "I have no problem with the Fed decision. I think the Fed exercised their independence, which is what we elect them to do," Sen. Mike Rounds (R-S.D.) told The Hill, pointing to markets as "a true barometer of what's going on." Stocks did dip right after the hike, then the S&P 500 rose 1.14% and the Nasdaq 1.69% the next day.

Sen. John Kennedy (R-La.) said that rebound "is going to help the president long-term," adding that a Fed the markets trust "is a very important thing for the president to have on his side long-term." Senate Majority Leader John Thune (R-S.D.) said the Fed is "trying their best to ensure that they're meeting their mission," though he acknowledged the hike "is not going to be helpful in terms of lowering costs in the near term."

Warsh has been blunt about why the Fed moved. "This summer's inflation readings do not tell me that underlying trends have meaningfully improved," he said Wednesday, according to CNN. The Labor Department reported consumer prices rose 3.4% year-over-year in August, with the monthly rate quadrupling from July to 0.4%, PBS reported. CNN also flagged that the USDA this week forecast lower farm income for the year, citing record diesel prices and rising fertilizer costs.

Inflation data contradicts Trump's convention claim last week in Dallas that "almost every item" is getting cheaper. Whether tariffs and the war with Iran contributed to that inflation, as CNN argues, or whether the Fed is overreacting, as Trump argues, is a genuine dispute the Fed's own numbers don't fully settle. The FOMC vote was unanimous, and Warsh, when asked directly what message he had for Trump, said, "I've got nothing for you on a discussion with the president," according to Fox News.

The Supreme Court fight

The same week, the Supreme Court rejected a Trump administration plan requiring states to use special barcoded mail envelopes and upload approved-voter lists to a new Postal Service portal, intended to screen against noncitizen voting in the run-up to the midterms. Trump accused Justices Neil Gorsuch, Brett Kavanaugh, Amy Coney Barrett and Chief Justice John Roberts of being "bullied and cajoled by the Radical Left" and said his own appointees "are merely a shell of their original selves," AOL reported.

Guarding against noncitizen voting is a mainstream election-integrity concern, and the administration framed the screening plan as exactly that. But the Court's objection wasn't to the goal. It was to the timing and execution. Kavanaugh, whom Trump appointed in 2018, wrote in a concurring opinion that reworking mail-ballot procedures this close to the election would be "arbitrary and capricious" and wouldn't give states enough time to "reasonably implement" the changes.

Senate Republicans sided with the Court over the president. "The president is entitled to his opinion, but I don't agree with him," Kennedy said of Trump's bullying claim, adding, "I know every one of the justices. I think they do their very best to call it like they see it." Sen. John Cornyn (R-Texas) called the plan "a recipe for chaos" given the seven-week runway before Election Day. "I'm all for voter integrity measures and there's plenty of ways to do that," Cornyn said, "but restricting the availability of mail-in ballots is, to me, counterproductive."

No court has found evidence of the noncitizen voting the plan was meant to prevent, and no evidence was presented in these sources establishing such fraud occurred. The ruling turned on process, not on whether the underlying integrity concern was legitimate.

What's next

The Fed's next scheduled meeting falls in late October, days before the midterms, and CNN reports another rate increase is possible if inflation stays elevated. Trump has suggested he could respond by moving to cut off a large share of U.S. trade if rates don't come down, a threat that would land in the middle of the campaign's final stretch. Whether Senate Republicans keep distancing themselves from the White House on institutional fights, or fall back in line once ballots are actually being counted, remains an open question heading into November.