\n<\/p>\n
Donald Trump fired the federal government official in charge of labor statistics, hours after data revealed jobs growth stalled this summer, prompting accusations that he is \u201cfiring the messenger\u201d.<\/p>\n
The US president claimed that Erika McEntarfer, commissioner of labor statistics, had \u201cfaked\u201d employment figures in the run-up to last year\u2019s election, in an effort to boost Kamala Harris\u2019s chances of victory.<\/p>\n
Trump later claimed: \u201cToday\u2019s Jobs Numbers were RIGGED in order to make the Republicans, and ME, look bad\u201d.<\/p>\n
He produced no evidence for these allegations, and insisted that the US economy was, in fact, \u201cBOOMING\u201d on his watch.<\/p>\n
But Friday\u2019s employment figures told a very different story, and raised questions about the state of the labor market since Trump\u2019s return to office.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe need accurate Jobs Numbers,\u201d he wrote on Truth Social. \u201cI have directed my Team to fire this Biden Political Appointee, IMMEDIATELY. She will be replaced with someone much more competent and qualified.\u201d<\/p>\n
McEntarfer was contacted for comment. The Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) confirmed in a brief statement that she had been dismissed. William Wiatrowski, the agency\u2019s deputy commissioner, will serve as acting commissioner.<\/p>\n
Trump\u2019s abrupt announcement came as administration officials scrambled to explain a lackluster employment report. Not only did jobs growth fail to meet expectations in July, but previous estimates for May and June were revised significantly lower.<\/p>\n
a graph of jobs growth numbers<\/p>\n
The president was promptly accused of trying to hide accurate statistics. \u201cTrump is firing the messenger because he doesn\u2019t seem to like jobs numbers that reflect how badly he\u2019s damaged the economy,\u201d said Lily Roberts, managing director for inclusive growth at the Center for American Progress, a thinktank.<\/p>\n
\u201cPoliticizing our country\u2019s collection of data on what\u2019s going on in the economy \u2026 will make it harder to create an economy that makes sure everyone has a good job,\u201d added Roberts. \u201cBorrowing from the authoritarian playbook fuels more uncertainty that will cost Americans for years to come.\u201d<\/p>\n
Paul Schroeder, executive director of the Council of Professional Associations on Federal Statistics, described the president\u2019s allegation as \u201cvery damaging and outrageous\u201d, adding: \u201cNot only does it undermine the integrity of federal economic statistics but it also politicizes data which need to remain independent and trustworthy. This action is a grave error by the administration and one that will have ramifications for years to come.\u201d<\/p>\n
McEntarfer is a widely respected economist and veteran employee of the federal government. She previously worked at the US Census Bureau under George W Bush and at the US census bureau under Barack Obama, Trump and Joe Biden.<\/p>\n
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Sign up to This Week in Trumpland<\/span><\/p>\n A deep dive into the policies, controversies and oddities surrounding the Trump administration<\/p>\n Privacy Notice: <\/strong>Newsletters may contain info about charities, online ads, and content funded by outside parties. For more information see our Privacy Policy. We use Google reCaptcha to protect our website and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply.<\/span><\/p>\n after newsletter promotion<\/p>\n In January 2024, before McEntarfer\u2019s confirmation for her current post by the US Senate, her nomination was backed by four former BLS commissioners.<\/p>\n In a letter also signed by organizations including the American Statistics Association and a string of senior economists, they said there were \u201cmany reasons\u201d to confirm McEntarfer as commissioner of labor statistics, citing her \u201cwealth of research and statistical experience\u201d.<\/p>\n She was ultimately confirmed by a vote in the Senate, with 86 votes cast in favor and eight against.<\/p>\n Gene Sperling, chair of the national economic council under Bill Clinton and Obama, and who worked as an official under Biden, said he expected Trump to \u201cdestroy the credibility\u201d of economic data when his administration suffered its first bad jobs report. \u201cNow: first bad job report, and he just fired BLS head over absurd claims of bias,\u201d Sperling wrote on X, formerly Twitter.<\/p>\n Trump\u2019s decision to fire McEntarfer was \u201coutrageous but not surprising\u201d, said Julie Su, former acting US labor secretary under Biden. \u201cHe hates facts, so he blames truth-tellers.\u201d<\/p>\n The US \u201cneeds and deserves trustworthy economic data\u201d, added Su. \u201cThis is a pathetic attempt by the president to gaslight everyone about the consequences of his disastrous economic policies.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Donald Trump fired the federal government official in charge of labor statistics, hours after data revealed jobs growth stalled this summer, prompting accusations that he is \u201cfiring the messenger\u201d. The US president claimed that Erika McEntarfer, commissioner of labor statistics, had \u201cfaked\u201d employment figures in the run-up to last year\u2019s election, in an effort to<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":13759,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[49],"tags":[794,689,1111,5412,3841,1927,2622,864,7433,7434,7267,81],"class_list":{"0":"post-13758","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-business","8":"tag-administration","9":"tag-chief","10":"tag-data","11":"tag-fires","12":"tag-growth","13":"tag-hours","14":"tag-jobs","15":"tag-labor","16":"tag-showed","17":"tag-slowed","18":"tag-statistics","19":"tag-trump"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13758","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=13758"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13758\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/13759"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=13758"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=13758"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=13758"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}