Federal Reserve President Stephen Milan speaks with CNBC at the Invest i America Forum on October 15, 2025.
Aaron Cramage | CNBC
The Fed’s decision to cut the federal funds rate by a quarter of a point on Wednesday had two opponents from two different directions.
Fed President Stephen Milan instead called for a half-point rate cut, but Kansas City Fed President Jeffrey Schmidt voted in favor of no rate cut.
“There was no doubt about the decision to cut interest rates by 25 basis points in October, but the unexpectedly hawkish opposition from regional Fed presidents makes the future move more controversial,” said Michael Pearce, deputy chief U.S. economist at Oxford Economics. “We expect the Fed to slow the pace of rate cuts from here.”
Heather Long, chief economist at Navy Federal Credit Union, said the pair’s dissenting opinions are “unusual,” especially since one is calling for further cuts and the other is not calling for changes.
Kansas City Fed President Jeffrey Schmidt speaks in Jackson Hole on August 22, 2024.
David A. Grogan | CNBC
“Chairman (Jerome) Powell will need to use all of his leadership over the coming months to keep Fed leaders moving in the same direction,” he said.
This is Milan’s second consecutive dissent, as he was the only dissenter when he called for a 0.5 point cut in interest rates at the September meeting. Instead, the central bank cut the federal funds rate by 25 basis points, or one-quarter of a percentage point.
Milan joined the Fed in September after being appointed by President Donald Trump and confirmed by the Senate. Governor Schmidt voted in favor of a rate cut in September, even though he expressed some doubts about it in a CNBC interview in late August.
