Senators advance Warsh nomination after DOJ drops Fed chair probe

US Senators voted on party lines Wednesday to advance the nomination of Kevin Warsh, President Donald Trump’s pick to lead the Federal Reserve.

The vote in the Senate Banking Committee puts Warsh on a glide path to confirmation. The entire Senate is expected to vote on Warsh’s nomination in the coming weeks.

Warsh was nominated by the president in January, but his confirmation stalled due to opposition from Senator Thom Tillis, a Republican from North Carolina.

Tillis, the swing vote on the Banking Committee, refused to support Warsh so long as federal prosecutors were investigating outgoing Fed Chair Jerome Powell. Powell, Tillis, and many Democrats said the investigation was a brazen attempt by the president’s allies to cow a member of the Fed’s board of governors into voting to lower interest rates.

“You have extraordinary credentials. They're impeccable,” Tillis told Warsh at a hearing last week. “Let's get rid of this investigation so I can support your confirmation.”

US Attorney Jeanine Pirro said on Friday she would drop the investigation, and Tillis promptly said he would support Warsh’s nomination.

But Pirro said she “wouldn’t hesitate” to reopen the case, a statement that Senator Elizabeth Warren, the top Democrat on the committee, highlighted on Wednesday.

“No one is fooled,” Warren said. “Trump is still going after control of the Fed, and he is keeping the threat of bogus charges alive until he gets what he wants.”

Warsh’s independence from the Fed — or…