File - Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell attends a news conference following a Federal Open Market Committee meeting, Wednesday, June 14, 2023, at the Federal Reserve Board Building in Washington. On Wednesday, the Federal Reserve releases minutes from its June meeting when it chose not to raise its benchmark borrowing rate for the first time in 15 months in its fight against inflation. (AP Photo/Jacquelyn Martin, File)
WASHINGTON (AP) – Some Federal Reserve officials pushed to raise the Fed’s key interest rate by one-quarter of a percentage point at their meeting last month to fight high inflation, though the central bank ultimately decided to forgo a rate hike.
In a sign of growing division among the policymakers, some officials favored a quarter-point increase or said they “could have supported such a proposal,” according to the minutes of the June 13-14 meeting released Wednesday. In the end, the 11 voting members of the Fed’s interest-rate setting committee agreed unanimously to skip a hike after 10 straight increases. But they signaled that they may raise rates twice more this year, beginning as soon as this month.
In Fed parlance, “some” is less than “most” or “many,” evidence that the support for another rate hike was a minority view. And some who held that view were likely unable to vote at the meeting; the 18 members of the Fed’s policymaking committee vote on a rotating basis.
Though the vote was ultimately unanimous, it is uncommon for the Fed to stipulate in minutes that some officials disagreed with the committee’s decision.
