Two of Donald Trump\u2019s top economic officials \u2014 Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent and Federal Housing Finance Agency Director Bill Pulte \u2014 nearly came to blows last week during a dinner at the Exclusive Club, CNN reported, citing several people familiar with the incident. Witnesses said Bessent threatened to punch Pulte in the face and accused him of talking to Trump about him privately, which quickly escalated into a heated argument. One witness said Bessent threatened to have Pulte leave or he would leave, after which the argument was broken up by a club co-founder who demanded they disperse. After Bessent briefly retreated, neither participant left the venue, which was attended by nearly 30 people, many of whom hold senior administration positions.<\/p>\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n
The White House declined to comment. At the heart of the dispute is a long-running power struggle between Bessent, Pulte and Commerce Secretary Howard Lutyck, who is close to Pulte, according to two people familiar with the matter. Trump has publicly praised both men in recent days, calling them \u201cdifferent people\u201d and \u201ccharming and wonderful\u201d in their own ways. Pulte has gained more influence in recent weeks, battling the Fed and governors.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
At the center of the dispute is a struggle for influence and place in a system where Trump is trying to reshape the Fed\u2019s board and is pushing for lower interest rates. This is not the first time Bessent has clashed with now-former White House adviser Elon Musk earlier this year over who should lead the IRS. Bessent attended the U.S. Open with Trump on Sunday, though he sat a few seats away from the president.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Two of Donald Trump\u2019s top economic officials \u2014 Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent and Federal Housing Finance Agency Director Bill Pulte \u2014 nearly came to blows last week during a dinner…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":79,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[27],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-84","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-politics"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/mollidicac.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/84","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/mollidicac.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/mollidicac.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mollidicac.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mollidicac.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=84"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/mollidicac.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/84\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":85,"href":"https:\/\/mollidicac.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/84\/revisions\/85"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mollidicac.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/79"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/mollidicac.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=84"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mollidicac.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=84"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mollidicac.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=84"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}