President Donald Trump ousted the head of the Labor Department’s statistical arm Friday after the latest monthly jobs report came in well under expectations.
“I have directed my Team to fire this Biden Political Appointee, IMMEDIATELY,” Trump wrote in a social media post. “She will be replaced with someone much more competent and qualified.”
The removal of Bureau of Labor Statistics Commissioner Erika McEntarfer came after Trump reprised prior accusations that BLS surreptitiously put out overly rosy jobs numbers at the tail end of the Biden administration that were revised in an effort to influence the election. Economists have roundly dismissed those claims as a misunderstanding of the agency’s revision processes.
BLS produces some of the country’s most closely watched economic statistics, such as the monthly jobs and inflation reports, which feature prominently in the Federal Reserve’s assessment of the economy. Those reports are also critical to businesses when they develop investment and hiring plans.
“Important numbers like this must be fair and accurate, they can’t be manipulated for political purposes,” Trump wrote. “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.”
In a follow-up post, Trump called Friday’s report “RIGGED” to make him and the Republican Party look bad.
Labor Secretary Lori Chavez-DeRemer said she supported Trump’s decision and that Deputy Commissioner William Wiatrowski will step in on an acting basis. Wiatrowski has twice held the acting title, including for more than two years at the outset of Trump’s first term.
“A recent string of major revisions have come to light and raised concerns about decisions being made by the Biden-appointed Labor Commissioner,” Chavez DeRemer wrote on social media.
News of Trump’s move against the BLS head added to jitters in markets, which were already in the red as investors processed Trump’s new tariff regime and the lackluster jobs report.
“What does a bad leader do when they get bad news? Shoot the messenger,” Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer said on the floor shortly after Trump’s post.
Though a part of the Labor Department, BLS has traditionally operated with considerable autonomy from the rest of the agency to insulate it from political interference and provide security to financial markets that its data is trustworthy.
“It is absolutely essential for financial markets to be able to trust the incoming data,” said Torsten Slok, chief economist at Apollo Global Management. “This is of extreme importance to policymakers, financial markets, consumers, and firms.”
Trump’s fury comes as he has also lashed out against the Fed for not cutting interest rates to his liking, a monthslong saga that continues to play out in public.
“Jerome ‘Too Late’ Powell should also be put ‘out to pasture,” Trump wrote in the same message where he called for McEntarfer’s firing.
Fed officials have been in a holding pattern on interest rates out of fear that tariffs might provide a dangerous boost of inflation, though signs of a weakening economy might also prompt them to lower borrowing costs. The data put out by BLS is a key input to that decision.
Trump has a long history of questioning the validity of government economic data — he famously backed former GE Chair Jack Welch’s claim that the Obama administration was manipulating unemployment data at the height of the 2012 presidential campaign. But he’s also used favorable employment and inflation reports to tout his stewardship of the economy
BLS has scaled back data-collection efforts for its benchmark inflation report amid staffing shortages and proposed budget cuts. Earlier this week, the bureau said those reductions, which result in a greater reliance on mathematical assumptions to bridge data gaps, were more extensive than previously indicated.
Kevin Hassett, the head of Trump’s National Economic Council, said that BLS’s analyses have struggled since Covid and that Trump is within his rights to get a “fresh set of eyes” on the agency.
“BLS has been revising numbers all over the place, in a way that makes it so that I don’t think anybody really can trust that the numbers are right, whichever way they’re going,” Hassett said on Fox Business Network.
McEntarfer was confirmed to the role in 2024 by a 86-8 Senate vote. She previously served as an economist for President Joe Biden’s Council of Economic Advisors and also worked as a labor economist at the U.S. Census Bureau and Treasury Department.
William Beach, who led BLS during Trump’s first term, called the president’s attack on McEntarfer’s integrity a “baseless, damaging claim that undermines the valuable work and dedication of BLS staff who produce the reports each month.”
This escalates the President’s unprecedented attacks on the independence and integrity of the federal statistical system,” Beach said in a statement co-signed by a group that includes fellow former Commissioner Erica Groshen and Paul Schroeder, the executive director of the Council of Professional Associations on Federal Statistics.
Michael Horrigan, president of the Upjohn Institute and a BLS veteran who oversaw the employment, unemployment, and inflation measurement program, called Trump’s attack on McEntarfer “absolutely inappropriate.”
“Just because numbers came out that the administration did not like, they immediately turn around and fire the commissioner,” Horrigan said. “Without knowing what those numbers mean, without understanding what goes behind the data, and the integrity of data collection. The charges that the numbers were faked is completely false and the fact that she was appointed by Biden is immaterial.”
Horrigan and other experts said they still have faith in BLS’ rank-and-file and the agency’s statistical work. Nevertheless, Trump’s abrupt action threatens to poison that well.
Trump vowed to replace McEntarfer with someone “much more competent and qualified,” though whoever selects will likely face deep skepticism from Congress and Wall Street.
“Unfortunately, it will call into question the validity and reliability of the data used to collect the most sensitive economic metrics: the U.S. unemployment rate and the monthly jobs growth rate,” said Joe Brusuelas, the chief economist at the consulting firm RSM.
Victoria Guida contributed to this report.
CORRECTION: An earlier version of this story mischaracterized McEntarfer’s role with the Council of Economic Advisors.