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A Project of The Annenberg Public Policy Center

Issues: Bureau of Labor Statistics

No Evidence for Trump’s Claims of ‘Rigged’ or ‘Phony’ Job Numbers

No Evidence for Trump’s Claims of ‘Rigged’ or ‘Phony’ Job Numbers
August 4, 2025

Hours after the Bureau of Labor Statistics released employment data showing slow job growth for July and prior months, President Donald Trump fired the BLS commissioner, claiming the job numbers were “phony” and that the commissioner had “faked” other job figures to help Democrats. There’s no evidence the commissioner, or others at BLS, manipulated the data, and Trump hasn’t provided any.

Trump Calls a Routine Revision of Job Numbers a ‘Lie’

Trump Calls a Routine Revision of Job Numbers a ‘Lie’
August 27, 2024

Each year, the Bureau of Labor Statistics revises its monthly employment figures, which come from a survey of employers, based on more comprehensive data it obtains later from state filings. But former President Donald Trump called this year’s revision a “total lie,” baselessly claiming that “the Harris/Biden administration has been caught fraudulently manipulating job statistics.”