President Trump ordered the dismissal Friday of the head of the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS), hours after the economic data collection agency released a report showing unemployment ticked up last month.
Now-former BLS Commissioner Erika McEntarfer, an appointee of former President Joe Biden, triggered Trump’s fury after her agency announced lower than expected employment gains in July and revised the numbers for May and June downward by a total of 258,000 jobs.
The president accused McEntarfer of manipulating the data and charged that she had done so in the past.
“I believe the numbers were phony, just like they were before the election,” Trump told reporters as he left the White House to spend the weekend at his Bedminster, NJ club. “So you know what I did? I fired her.”
A BLS spokesperson confirmed McEntarfer “was terminated today” and Deputy Commissioner William Wiatrowski will take over on an acting basis.
McEntarfer, a career federal employee, was confirmed by the Senate to lead BLS in January 2024 after previously serving as a senior economist at the White House Council of Economic Advisors under Biden.
Trump explained in a Truth Social post that he was “just informed” that the nation’s employment reports were “being produced by a Biden Appointee” and charged that McEntarfer “faked the Jobs Numbers before the Election to try and boost Kamala’s chances of Victory.”
“This is the same Bureau of Labor Statistics that overstated the Jobs Growth in March 2024 by approximately 818,000 and, then again, right before the 2024 Presidential Election, in August and September, by 112,000,” the president wrote. “These were Records — No one can be that wrong?”
Last August’s revision of job growth for the 12 months ending in March 2024 – the largest downward revision to US payroll figures since 2009 – drew outrage from some Republican lawmakers, who suggested the numbers were intentionally fudged to boost the Harris-Biden administration.
“We need accurate Jobs Numbers,” Trump wrote, noting that McEntarfer would be “replaced with someone much more competent and qualified.”
“Important numbers like this must be fair and accurate, they can’t be manipulated for political purposes,” he continued. “McEntarfer said there were only 73,000 Jobs added (a shock!) but, more importantly, that a major mistake was made by them, 258,000 Jobs downward, in the prior two months.”
“Similar things happened in the first part of the year, always to the negative.”
Sen. Roger Marshall (R-Kan.), who demanded testimony from McEntarfer last year over the Biden-era job stats revisions, praised Trump for removing her from the top BLS post.
“I have been raising concerns for the past year about inaccurate job numbers put out by Dr. Erika McEntarfer,” Marshall wrote on X. “Her cooked-up numbers have misled the American people for too long.”
“Glad President [Trump] is going to clean this up.”
Trump doubled-down in a separate social media post, arguing that the July BLS report was “RIGGED in order to make the Republicans, and ME, look bad.”
Trump told reporters Friday he has “about three” people in mind to replace McEntarfer.
“I have a lot of good candidates. I will say, everybody wants it,” he said. “We’re gonna put someone in who can be honest.”
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