National Economic Council Director Kevin Hassett on Sunday defended President Donald Trump’s decision to fire Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) Commissioner Erika McEntarfer, citing massive downward revisions in job data as “hard evidence” of a pattern that raised serious questions about the agency’s credibility under her leadership.
Appearing on NBC’s Meet the Press, Hassett pushed back against claims that the firing lacked justification, pointing to last year’s 818,000-job downward revision as a red flag. “There was an 818,000 revision making the Joe Biden job record a lot worse that came out after he withdrew from the presidential campaign,” Hassett said. “There have been a bunch of patterns that could make people wonder.”
The revisions, he argued, show why the president had every right to remove a Biden-era political appointee whose office has presided over the largest credibility collapse in recent memory. “It’s the president’s highest priority that the data be trusted,” Hassett added. “And that people get to the bottom of why these revisions are so unreliable.”
“There was an 818,000 [downward] revision making the Joe Biden job record a lot worse that came out AFTER he withdrew,” says National Economic Council Director Kevin Hassett on jobs numbers.
“It’s the President’s highest priority that the data be trusted.” pic.twitter.com/6Fhuqe97B8
— Rapid Response 47 (@RapidResponse47) August 3, 2025
President Trump announced McEntarfer’s firing on Friday after the latest jobs report revealed weaker-than-expected hiring—only 73,000 jobs added in the past month—and another round of negative revisions to previous months, slashing earlier job gain estimates by over 250,000. The data not only embarrassed Biden-era defenders of the “strong labor market” narrative but also reinforced Trump’s argument that the reports were politicized and manipulated.
Democrats and some former BLS officials cried foul. William Beach, who once led the bureau himself, told CNN that he believed the firing undermines trust in the agency. “It really hurts the statistical system. It undermines credibility in BLS,” Beach claimed. “Suppose that they get a new commissioner… and they do a bad number. Well, everybody’s going to think, well, it’s not as bad as it probably really is, because they’re going to suspect political influence.”
But Hassett countered that the damage to public trust didn’t begin with Trump—it started with McEntarfer and the erratic data her office produced. Speaking on Fox News Sunday, he emphasized that the problem wasn’t about partisan discomfort with a single report, but with a consistent pattern of late and lopsided revisions that benefited Democrats when it mattered most.
“If I were running the BLS and I had the biggest downward revision in 50 years, I would have a really, really detailed report explaining why it happened so that everybody really trusted the data,” Hassett said. “But instead, they have this little black box that moves the numbers around and makes people wonder.”
National Economic Council Director Kevin Hassett on jobs numbers: “When the data are unreliable, when they keep being revised all over the place, then there are going to be people that wonder if there’s a partisan pattern in the data.” pic.twitter.com/ORjx0WgLcz
— Rapid Response 47 (@RapidResponse47) August 3, 2025
The issue, according to Trump officials, is not just technical—it’s systemic. During Biden’s term, job reports often showed unexpectedly strong growth in the weeks leading up to critical political moments, only to be revised sharply downward after the fact. The pattern repeated itself enough that even nonpartisan observers began to question the reliability of BLS data.
Trump’s decision to clean house at the BLS signals that his administration is not going to tolerate manipulated or questionable statistics—especially from appointees with a political history. The White House has already begun searching for McEntarfer’s replacement, with insiders hinting at a nominee who will emphasize transparency, accountability, and methodological reform.
As Hassett made clear, this isn’t about silencing unfavorable data. It’s about restoring integrity to the numbers Americans rely on. “What we need is a fresh set of eyes at the BLS,” he said. “Somebody who can clean this thing up.”
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