National Economic Council Director Kevin Hassett is pushing back on a report that he is getting ready to leave the Trump administration. He called the story flatly “not true.”
Hassett denied it Friday in a text message to CNBC’s Eamon Javers, a few hours after Semafor reported that the president’s top economic adviser was expected to leave in the coming weeks. Semafor cited three people familiar with the matter and said Hassett “has been inquiring about roles outside the administration.” It said those inquiries started even before the Nov. 3 midterm elections.
The White House moved quickly to shut the story down.
“There is no factual basis for this reporting,” a White House official said. “Kevin Hassett is a key member of President Trump’s economic team and will continue working to advance President Trump’s economic policies.”
Semafor’s report went further and floated possible replacements for the NEC post. Among the names it said were under consideration were Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent, who the outlet said could hold both jobs at once, and Bessent’s counselor, David Zervos. The report also said Hassett’s plans could change.
The dust-up comes at a turbulent moment for the administration. Democrats flipped both chambers of Congress in last week’s midterms, and several Trump administration officials have stepped down since the election. Those departures have fed speculation in Washington about who else might be leaving, and anonymously sourced reports have rushed in to fill the gap.
Hassett is no newcomer to the president’s inner circle. He chaired the White House Council of Economic Advisers during Trump’s first term and came back in 2020 to help with the administration’s economic response to the coronavirus pandemic. When Trump returned to office, Hassett took over the National Economic Council, and he has run it for the whole of the president’s second term so far.
The veteran economist was previously a scholar at the conservative American Enterprise Institute. He was also in the running to replace Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell last year, before the president picked Kevin Warsh for the job.
As NEC director, Hassett has been one of the administration’s most visible voices on economic policy. If he stays, that would give the White House some continuity as it gets ready to face a Democrat-controlled Congress starting in January.
This is not the first time Hassett has faced questions about his future in the administration. When he stepped down as CEA chair in 2019, he rejected suggestions that policy disagreements were behind the move. He called it “normal, circle of life kind of stuff” and said about two years was a typical tenure for the job.
This time, Hassett insists he isn’t going anywhere.
The Treasury Department declined to comment on the report.
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