“Mr. President, are there things the chairman can say to you today that would make you back off some of the earlier criticisms?” asked a reporter during the meeting.

“Well, I’d love him to lower interest rates!” Trump said, patting Powell on the back. “Other than that, what can I tell you?”

Trump has floated the idea of firing Powell over his refusal to cut interest rates, which currently sit at around 4.33%.

After receiving blowback, however, Trump has moved to criticize Powell for a series of expensive renovations to the central bank headquarters in Washington, D.C., something critics have pegged as a tool to give Trump the legal pretext to fire Powell at a time of his choosing.

Trump has urged Powell to cut interest rates down to 1%, and has labeled Powell a partisan actor for having cut rates during former President Joe Biden’s four-year stint in the White House.

But some experts have cautioned that arbitrarily cutting rates as Trump wants could backfire, and in effect kick off a wave of higher real-world interest rates and soaring prices.