President-elect Joe Biden plans to nominate Janet Yellen to be his treasury secretary, according to reports in The Wall Street Journal and CNBC.
Yellen, who served for one term as the chair of the Federal Reserve, would make history as the first female secretary of the Department of the Treasury, a particularly influential role now with the economy still reeling from the pandemic.
The 74-year-old economist is used to breaking barriers and will arguably be one of the most experienced economic policy advisers to hold the position, especially compared to current Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin, who came to the White House with experience producing films and in banking. She was the first woman to run the White House Council of Economic Advisers and served as a Fed governor in the 1990s.
As Federal Reserve chair, Yellen was known for bringing more attention to the labor market as a key factor in making decisions about raising interest rates. And she also spoke up about how family-friendly federal policy could boost the economy.
As treasury secretary, Yellen would have more influence to see those kinds of fiscal policies translate into reality.
“I’m very happy about the Yellen announcement,” said Heidi Shierholz, who leads the economic policy team at the progressive Economic Policy Institute and served in the Obama administration, citing Yellen’s strong performance as Fed chair. “One key thing about her: Her decisions are guided by data and evidence, not ideology and not partisanship ― it’s data. It’s evidence.”
She was nominated to the role by President Barack Obama and received bipartisan support in 2014, when 11 Republican senators voted to confirm her. Many observers were surprised when Trump failed to renominate her in 2018, a break with precedent. Some, including this reporter, attributed Trump’s ditching of a qualified woman for a man to pure sexism.
Recently, Yellen has advocated for the government to do more to help boost the economy right now. “There is a huge amount of suffering out there. The economy needs the spending,” Yellen said an interview last month, according to the Journal.
Congressional Republicans are currently holding up any further efforts to stimulate the economy, even as unemployment benefits and other measures passed to deal with the coronavirus this spring are set to expire at the end of the year and as the U.S. faces a third surge of COVID-19 cases and deaths.
This is a developing story. Please check back for updates.