The search for a new leader of the Federal Reserve Bank of Atlanta has stalled after an initial slate of finalists didn't yield a choice, forcing the bank to reboot a process now entering its seventh month, according to people familiar with the search.
The episode is, on its surface, a procedural complication. But it is unfolding at a time when the Fed's independence from political control has come under strain. The reserve bank presidents are central to that independence: they help set interest rates and their appointments are deliberately shielded from the political process that governs the rest of Washington.
The selection of a regional Fed president is a two-step process. Each of the 12 reserve banks is overseen by a board of nine directors, six of whom choose the bank's next president. Their choice must then be approved by the Fed's Washington-based board of governors.
The two bodies traditionally collaborate, so that the district advances a candidate Washington will accept. The process, however, can be unwieldy. The local directors, though accomplished business and civic leaders, have seldom run a search for a policymaker who will help steer the economy for years to come.
The Atlanta Fed interviewed a slate of finalists in April, with an eye toward announcing the selection by May, according to people familiar with the matter. Among them was Rebecca Patterson, a former executive for hedge fund giant Bridgewater Associates. She fit several of the committee's criteria: she has management experience and roots in the district, having graduated from the University of Florida.
Though a favorite of the district directors, she never interviewed with the Fed board, the second stage of the process, according to people familiar with the matter. The reasons for the delay, and Patterson's current status, couldn't be learned. The delay means Kevin Warsh, who became chairman May 22, will have a say in the appointment.
This group of finalists included Marc Sumerlin, an economic consultant and former adviser to President George W. Bush. He interviewed last year with Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent for Fed chair and in 2019 the Trump administration considered him for a Fed governor appointment. The Atlanta Fed didn't advance his candidacy, and he is no longer under consideration, according to people familiar with the matter.
The delays were reported earlier by the Financial Times.
Gregory Haile -- who chairs the Atlanta Fed's board and the committee searching for a new president -- said in a statement that it "is conducting a thorough and deliberate search" and is focused on "selecting the best candidate to serve the Sixth District, while protecting the integrity of the process."
Assisting the Atlanta Fed with the search is executive-recruiting firm Heidrick & Struggles.
The official who oversees this process in Washington is Fed governor Christopher Waller, who has chaired the board's committee on reserve bank affairs since 2022. Waller has been pressing the regional banks to cede more operational autonomy, while the banks have pushed back against his plan to centralize back-office functions. While that issue isn't about monetary policy, it overlaps with the more sensitive question of who runs the banks in the first place.
The White House has no formal role in the process of appointing reserve bank presidents. But the unsettled search led some presidential advisers to explore whether they might influence the makeup of the Fed by encouraging officials to choose a candidate more sympathetic to the administration's policies, people familiar with matter said. The Atlanta Fed president will hold one of the rotating votes on the rate-setting Federal Open Market Committee next year.
One name some advisers have raised is Michael Faulkender, who was pushed out of a senior position at the Treasury Department last year. His candidacy for the Atlanta job didn't advance as far as others, according to people familiar with the matter.
The breakdown is the latest twist following the departure of Raphael Bostic, who led the Atlanta Fed from 2017 until this past February. He announced his decision to retire last November, weeks before the Fed board voted unanimously to reappoint the other 11 reserve bank presidents to five-year terms beginning this past March.
The Atlanta Fed had received signals from the Fed board that Bostic faced potential obstacles to being reappointed over financial disclosure issues uncovered several years earlier, according to people familiar with the matter. The concern about his reappointment hasn't been previously reported.
In 2022, Bostic publicly reported what he described as inadvertent violations of the Fed's investment-management rules. The central bank's inspector general in 2024 found no evidence he had made investments based on his access to confidential information, but said violations of Fed policies created an appearance of acting on confidential information that could create a reason to question his impartiality.
The board's concern last year was less the disclosures themselves than the risks they created at a time when trading and ethics controversies had cost several Fed officials their positions, according to people familiar with the matter. The disclosures could have handed the Trump administration a pretext to pressure a future Fed board to dismiss Bostic -- something that has never happened to a sitting reserve bank president. The safer course, in that view, wasn't to create the vulnerability in the first place.
President Trump has looked for openings to remove Fed officials such as attempting -- unsuccessfully, so far -- to fire governor Lisa Cook.
Bostic said last year he chose to leave on his own. The approaching end of his term had been a "focusing event" prompting him to weigh "natural moments of transition," he told reporters in December. "This decision was mine to make, and I made it on my own," he said.
Write to Nick Timiraos at Nick.Timiraos@wsj.com
(END) Dow Jones Newswires
June 26, 2026 13:00 ET (17:00 GMT)
Copyright (c) 2026 Dow Jones & Company, Inc.
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