ANALYSIS — After President Donald Trump abruptly fired the Bureau of Labor Statistics commissioner, his declaration that "we need people that we can trust" has left Democratic lawmakers shaken. The president said those words as he left the White House on Friday shortly after he ordered the ouster of Erika McEntarfer. While he did not emphasize the latter “we,” to Democrats worried the move was the latest domino toward an authoritarian future to tumble, he didn’t have to. Trump was asked why anyone should trust jobs data published by BLS going forward. “That's the big thing. You're right. No, you're right. Why should anybody trust numbers? You go back to ... Election Day. Look what happened two or three days before, with massive wonderful job numbers, trying to get him elected or her elected, trying to get whoever the hell was running,” Trump said, alleging that prior BLS data releases and revisions were timed to help his Democratic opponents. Notably, he did not say if he would simply nominate a loyalist or install a supporter as the office’s acting director. Minutes later, Trump was asked if any federal government employee charged with publishing data he may not like should fear getting fired. His reply: “I've always had a problem with these numbers. I was thinking about it this morning. Before the numbers that came out, I said, ‘Who is the person that does these numbers?’" “And then they gave me stats about before the election, I had a similar problem. I mean, she gave out numbers that were so good for the Democrats. It was like, unbelievable,” Trump said. Congressional Democrats and left-leaning watchdogs have reacted to the firing and his comments since with fears that formerly independent government entities, and the data they produce, will now become vessels for pro-Trump propaganda. “It’s what confirmation hearings are supposed to be about. Is it going to be somebody that will maintain the independence of the Bureau of Labor Statistics, like so many other departments and agencies that need to have the independence from political pressure of the White House to do their job reliably,” Sen. Alex Padilla, D-Calif., a member of the Judiciary and Budget committees, said Sunday on NBC’s “Meet the Press.” “Or will this be another ‘yes’ person for the president that's going to be more interested in propaganda than statistics, more interested in propaganda than the facts,” he said, adding of the Friday firing: “I think an investigation is certainly in order. … There is example after example of Donald Trump weaponizing, no longer just the Department of Justice — but when he's trying to weaponize the Bureau of Labor Statistics, that tells you a lot about their insecurity about the economy.” Trump on Monday used a social media post to declare: “I will pick an exceptional replacement.” Even if Trump announces a nominee for the BLS commissioner post this month, a confirmation hearing would not take place before September — at the earliest. The Senate over the weekend joined the House on August recess, and is due back on Sept. 2. Larry Summers, who was Treasury secretary during the Clinton administration and National Economic Council director under President Barack Obama, told ABC’s “This Week” that there was "no conceivable way that the head of the BLS could have manipulated this number. The numbers are in line with what we’re seeing from all kinds of private sector sources.” McEntarfer’s firing “is the stuff of democracies giving way to authoritarianism,” Summers said, lumping the move with Trump “threatening the heads of newspapers,” targeting universities over policies he disagrees with, as well as “launching assaults on law firms that defend clients that the elected boss finds uncongenial.” “This is really scary stuff,” Summers added. 'Control and dominate' Virginia Rep. Robert C. Scott, the top Democrat on the House Education and Workforce Committee, said in a statement that the BLS chief’s sacking “comes without evidence of any misconduct after BLS reported that the economy showed poor job growth for three consecutive months – a fact with which too many Americans are aware." “Instead of properly addressing the consequences of his actions and taking reasonable steps to bolster the economy, President Trump’s action politicizes economic data and undermines the independence of yet another federal agency, seemingly out of frustration that the facts do not support his manufactured narrative,” Scott said. “Worse, today’s action serves as a warning to any future BLS officer that they should not dare to make the mistake of reporting accurate information.” But Kevin Hassett, the president’s top economic adviser, defended the move. “Basically, the 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,” he told Fox Business. “And so I think it is a good time for a fresh set of eyes to look at what the heck is going on, because the labor numbers are so important. It'd be so important that people trust them, and that they're not being revised all over the place all the time.” Robert Weissman, co-president of the watchdog group Public Citizen, said "the threat to the integrity of the Bureau of Labor Statistics ... will undermine not just public understanding but evidence-based policymaking altogether." “As with so much else under Trump, this move is profoundly troubling, but not surprising. Authoritarians always try to control and dominate the information landscape to undermine opposition to their harmful policies,” Weissman said in a statement. “Yet again, to advance his narrow, personal and political interests, Donald Trump is undermining the interests of the United States and leaving us a weaker and more vulnerable nation.” Summers contended that the BLS commissioner's firing went "way beyond anything that Richard Nixon ever did.” “I’m surprised that other officials have not responded by resigning themselves as took place when Richard Nixon fired people lawlessly," he said.
