Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-MA) blasted President Donald Trump for firing the Bureau of Labor Statistics commissioner.
According to the latest BLS report, the economy added just 73,000 jobs in July, and the unemployment rate rose a tenth of a percentage point to 4.2%. The report revised job data downward from what was collected over the last two months.
After the report came out, Trump fired BLS Commissioner Erika McEntarfer, an appointee of former President Joe Biden. Warren defended McEntarfer on MSNBC News’s Morning Joe Monday, saying she had “been there [at the BLS] a long time, before that has served both Republican and Democratic administrations.”
“When Donald Trump moves in and says, ‘I don’t like the numbers. These are bad job numbers’ — and they are bad job numbers — and he says, ‘Off with her head. We’re getting rid of her.’ What he does is he politicizes the numbers themselves,” Warren said.
The president claimed McEntarfer was operating politically since she “faked the jobs numbers” even before the November election, referring to an 818,000 revision after Biden dropped out of the 2024 race. At the time of this jobs report, the revisions represented 0.5% of total jobs.
“And the person who replaces her, what does that person do next? Do they only serve up nice numbers? Do they sort of re-sand the numbers, paint them a little different color?” Warren added.
“No, if that happens, then effectively you blind the United States and all of our policymakers, all of our decision-makers, all of our businesses, and you diminish us around the world.”
After this latest jobs report, Warren claimed it was Trump’s fault that “more people sat on the sidelines and stopped searching for work.”
KEVIN HASSETT DEFENDS TRUMP FIRING LABOR STATISTIC COMMISSIONER
“President Trump’s chaotic on-again, off-again tariffs are paralyzing the Fed while undermining the labor market and hurting working families,” Warren said at the time of the August 2024 report’s release.
National Economic Council Director Kevin Hassett defended the firing on behalf of the White House on Sunday, asserting, “What we need is a fresh set of eyes at the BLS.”