White House advisors defend firing of labour official
Donald Trump sacked former commissioner of labor statistics Erika McEntarfer (pictured) after accusing her of faking employment data for political reasons. Photo: Reuters
Top White House economic advisors have defended President Donald Trump's firing of the head of the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS), pushing back against criticism that Trump's action could undermine confidence in official US economic data.
US Trade Representative Jamieson Greer told CBS that Trump had "real concerns" about the data, while Kevin Hassett, director of the National Economic Council, said the president "is right to call for new leadership."
Hassett said on Fox News the main concern was Friday's BLS report of net downward revisions showing 258,000 fewer jobs had been created in May and June than previously reported.
Trump accused BLS Commissioner Erika McEntarfer of faking the jobs numbers, without providing any evidence of data manipulation. The BLS compiles the closely watched employment report as well as consumer and producer price data.
The BLS gave no reason for the revised data but noted "monthly revisions result from additional reports received from businesses and government agencies since the last published estimates and from the recalculation of seasonal factors."
McEntarfer responded to her abrupt dismissal on Friday in a post on the Bluesky social media platform, saying it was "the honour of her life" to serve as BLS commissioner and praising the civil servants who work there.
McEntarfer's firing added to growing concerns about the quality of US economic data published by the federal government and came on the heels of a raft of new US tariffs on dozens of trading partners.
"I think what we need is a fresh set of eyes at the BLS, somebody who can clean this thing up," Hassett said on "Fox News Sunday."
In an interview with CBS' "Face the Nation," Greer acknowledged there were always revisions of job numbers, "but sometimes you see these revisions go in really extreme ways."
Critics, including former leaders of the BLS, slammed Trump's move and called on Congress to investigate McEntarfer's removal, saying it would shake trust in a respected statistical agency.
"It undermines credibility," said William Beach, a former BLS commissioner and co-chair of the group Friends of the BLS.
"There is no way for a commissioner to rig the jobs numbers," he said. "Every year we've revised the numbers. When I was commissioner, we had a 500,000 job revision during President Trump's first term," he said on CNN's "State of the Union."
"And why do we do that? Because firms are created or firms go out of business, and we don't really know that during the course of the year, until we reconcile against a real full count of all the businesses." (Reuters)
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