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Hassett Briefs Reporters on the Fed, Tariffs and Egg Prices, Mar. 19, 2025

March 19, 2025 · Roll Call Factbase Videos · 0:05:26

Embedded from the source channel — never re-uploaded. Watch on YouTube

What happened

National Economic Council Director Kevin Hassett spoke to reporters outside the White House on March 19, 2025, in Roll Call Factbase Videos’ recording. Asked about Chair Powell’s remarks, Hassett said the White House respects the independence of the Fed and does not remark on its current policy decisions, and said Powell was clear that any tariff effect would be transitory — adding his own view, as he stated it, that the tariff effect is probably zero or negative. He cited a massive increase in industrial production in the previous day’s data, including an increase in auto production he said was bigger than the entire decline under the prior administration, as evidence the tariff policy was already onshoring car buying.

On growth, Hassett said a back-of-the-envelope model he learned from Alan Greenspan at the Fed put growth north of two percent — he had said two and a half a week earlier, as he stated it — against the Fed’s lower projection discussed at the gaggle. On egg prices, he said prices were down $2.50 a dozen, credited Secretary Brooke Rollins’s more prudent disease-management policy, and said the culling of chickens had gone almost to zero since January 20 after more than 100 million were culled in the prior administration’s final months, as he stated it.

Why it matters

The gaggle is Hassett’s early template for defending the tariff program at the sticks: Fed independence respected, tariff inflation dismissed as transitory or less, and the first hard-data claims — industrial production, autos, eggs — offered as proof.

Scoreboard watch

Scoreboard watch: Hassett’s March 19, 2025 figures as stated — growth north of 2% on his Greenspan model and egg prices down $2.50 a dozen — flagged for the scoreboard editors; the entry itself remains review-gated.

Sources: Roll Call Factbase Videos, ‘Press Briefing: Kevin Hassett Speaks to Reporters Outside the White House — March 19, 2025,’ uploaded May 12, 2025 (video GS86Q0b6BvU); transcript via Supadata (private research store, paraphrased and attributed, never republished verbatim).