Larry Summers says Trump's accusations of manipulated jobs numbers are ‘preposterous’
Former Treasury Secretary Larry Summers called President Donald Trump's accusation without providing evidence that the top Bureau of Labor Statistics official manipulated jobs report numbers "a preposterous charge" on Sunday.
Speaking with "This Week" anchor George Stephanopoulos, Summers said that one official would not be able to change the numbers.
"These numbers are put together by teams of literally hundreds of people following detailed procedures that are in manuals. There's no conceivable way that the head of the BLS could have manipulated this number," Summers said.
He added, "The numbers are in line with what we're seeing from all kinds of private sector sources. This is the stuff of democracies giving way to authoritarianism. It — firing statisticians goes with threatening the heads of newspapers. It goes with launching assaults on universities. It goes with launching assaults on law firms that defend clients that the elected boss finds uncongenial. This is really scary stuff."
Trump blasted Erika McEntarfer, the now-former commissioner of Labor Statistics, after the release of some disappointing jobs numbers on Friday and the revision downward of previous months' reports and said he had fired her for manipulating the figures for political purposes, but provided no evidence to support his claim.
"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. These were Records -- No one can be that wrong? We need accurate Jobs Numbers," Trump posted to his social media platform.
Stephanopoulos asked Summers, "I guess this firing of the BLS commissioner goes in the category of shocking but not surprising?"
"This is way beyond anything Richard Nixon ever did," Summers said of Trump's firing McEntarfer. "I'm surprised that other officials have not responded by resigning themselves, as took place when Richard Nixon fired people lawlessly."
Here are more highlights from Summers' interview
On Trump's bashing of Fed Chair Jerome Powell
Stephanopoulos: Adding to that uncertainty is the president's campaign against Jerome Powell, the head of the Federal Reserve, saying he's been a 'moron,' I think was the word the president used for not lowering interest rates so far. What's the impact of that?
Summers: Look, I think that this kind of political Fed-bashing is a fool's game. The Fed doesn't listen. So, short-term interest rates aren't going to be different because of it. The market does listen. So, longer-term interest rates are going to be higher, which is going to make it more expensive to buy a house. This is hurting the economy, not helping.
I think the president understands that. And what the president is doing is recognizing that for all kinds of reasons, of which his policies are very important ones, the economy's got a lot of risk, and he's looking to set up a scapegoat if the economy performs badly. That's what this attacking Chairman Powell is really about. It's not really about trying to change policy. There's no chance that that's going to happen to any substantial degree.
On Friday's jobs report and cutting interest rates
Stephanopoulos: The jobs report on Friday probably does increase the chances that the Fed will cut interest rates in -- in September. What's your take on what that report told us?
Summers: I think it told us that the economy is closer to stall speed than we thought that it was. The July number was weak. The big deal is the downwards revision for the two months before that. And that means there's a real possibility that we're in a stall speed kind of economy, which means we could tip over into recession. That wouldn't be my prediction right now, but the risk is greater certainly than it was before. And it's a risk we don't need to be taking, but it's a risk that's made more serious by these tariffs.
What your viewers should understand is that these tariffs are not job creators. When you raise tariffs on steel, for example -- yeah, there's some people who work in the steel industry, but there are 50 times as many who work in industries like the automobile industry who are now going to be much less competitive when they try to compete all over the world. So, this is a immense gift that we are giving to our country's adversaries. By alienating our allies like Canada, like Europe, we are making it much easier for China to grow and flourish in the global economy. And I just don't understand why we would want to do that, especially when what we're getting out of it is an increase of more than $2,000 in the bills that typical middle-class families are going to have to pay.
On the potential impacts of tariffs
Stephanopoulos: You know, the markets have been pretty complacent about the tariffs so far. Are we seeing their impact in this underlying jobs report?
Summers: I think that that is an element in it. I think both the direct effects of the tariffs, but probably more importantly, this sense of uncertainty that anything could happen, and who knows what business is going to be attacked next? Who knows what the rules are going to be? In an environment like that, what should a business do? It should sit and it should wait. Wait in terms of hiring people, wait in terms of new factory construction. What's keeping the economy going in significant part is not anything actually that's coming out of the president's policies.
