In a post on the Truth Social media platform, Trump accused BLS Commissioner Erika McEntarfer—a Democrat appointee—of manipulating employment data.
“I have just been informed that our country’s ’employment numbers’ are being fabricated by a Biden appointee, Dr. Erika McEntarfer, Commissioner of Labor Statistics, who falsified employment numbers prior to the election to boost Kamala [Harris]’s chances of winning,” Trump wrote. “We need accurate employment numbers. I have directed the immediate firing of this Biden appointee. She will be replaced by someone far more competent and qualified.”
A BLS spokesperson confirmed to CNBC that “Commissioner Erika McEntarfer’s contract was terminated today. Deputy Commissioner William Wiatrowski will serve as the acting commissioner.”
The BLS operates under the US Department of Labor, headed by Secretary Lori Chavez-DeRemer, a Trump appointee. Earlier on August 1, the BLS reported that non-farm payroll employment in the US rose by only 73,000 in July, falling short of market expectations. The bureau also significantly revised down the previous month’s job gains, slashing a total of 258,000 jobs from the initially reported figures for May and June. This marked the largest two-month downward adjustment since April 2020, the early days of the Covid crisis.
Trump and congressional Republicans have repeatedly criticized the BLS over the years for its data collection methods. In particular, the significant adjustments made to the figures between initial and subsequent releases have been a target of this criticism. Trump pointed out that last year, the BLS also made substantial revisions to the employment data, reducing the 12-month employment count ending March 2024 by 818,000 jobs.
In this year’s budget proposal, Trump suggested cutting 8% of staff at the BLS, raising concerns about the accuracy of employment, consumer price, and other economic data. Due to staffing shortages, the bureau has had to include an increasing amount of estimated data in some of its reports.
“Numbers this important must be fair and accurate, not manipulated for political purposes,” Trump wrote.
Prior to the BLS releasing the July non-farm payroll report on August 1, Trump had repeatedly made optimistic statements about the strength of the US job market. Following the initial release of June’s figures, the White House issued a statement calling it a “June jobs boom.”
The weaker-than-expected jobs report sent US stock markets tumbling on the same day, with the Dow Jones Industrial Average falling more than 500 points and the Nasdaq dropping over 2%. Yields on US Treasury bonds also fell sharply.
However, Peter Mallouk, president and chief investment officer of Creative Planning, argued that the president should not “fire someone who has served under multiple administrations in different roles because he doesn’t like the numbers.”
William Beach, a Trump appointee in 2017 and McEntarfer’s direct predecessor at the BLS, also strongly criticized her firing. “The baseless firing of Dr. Erika McEntarfer, my successor as Commissioner of Labor Statistics at BLS, sets a dangerous precedent and undermines the bureau’s statistical mission,” Beach posted on Social Network X, suggesting that “the president is looking to blame someone for unwelcome economic news.”
In an interview with NBC on August 3, Kevin Hasset, director of the National Economic Council (NEC), defended Trump’s decision to fire the jobs commissioner and stated that the president “wanted his person in that role.” Without providing any evidence to support the claim that the latest BLS jobs report was incorrect, Hasset argued that the “adjustments are clear evidence” of manipulated employment data.
“What we need are new people at the BLS,” he said, adding that if he were head of the BLS, “I would have a very detailed report to explain” the downward adjustments in job gains.
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