Janet Yellen Joins 2026 National Women’s Hall of Fame
Janet Yellen said her 2026 induction into the National Women’s Hall of Fame is “very special” because it places her inside “the story of women in America and their struggle to achieve equality.” The former Federal Reserve chair and treasury secretary said, “to me, it makes me part of that story.”
The hall, founded in 1969 in Seneca Falls, New York, inducts a class of women each year, with about half contemporary or living and half historic. Yellen’s inclusion puts her among women recognized for achievements that changed the top levels of U.S. public life.
Yellen’s economic posts
Yellen was the first woman to lead the Federal Reserve and the first female treasury secretary. She was also the first and only person to hold the three big U.S. economic leadership positions named in the source: Federal Reserve chair, treasury secretary, and chair of the White House council of economic advisors.
That sequence of posts is the reason the hall’s recognition lands differently for her than a standard honor. Her career is presented in the source as a set of barriers broken in offices that had long been occupied by men.
Fed independence and Trump
In the same interview, Yellen said she was “very worried about Fed independence” and warned that “We’ve seen the worst attacks on Fed independence in certainly in my lifetime.” She said the Federal Reserve’s job is “price stability and full employment,” but that a president had “very explicitly stated” the Fed should hold down the interest costs of the debt.
Yellen said, “That’s the road in a banana republic to high or even hyperinflation.” She added that she was particularly concerned about the president’s treatment of allies and approach to trade, saying he is “destroying a set of global rules that have enabled decades of peace and prosperity since World War II ended.”
Seneca Falls class of women
The hall’s annual class brings together women from different eras, and Yellen’s name now sits in a 2026 group that the organization uses to connect current public leaders with figures from earlier generations. Her remarks frame the honor as recognition of a career that reached the highest levels of economic decision-making and as a place in a wider record of women’s progress.
