Just 22,000 Jobs in August, the First Report Since Trump Fired BLS Chief

President Donald Trump speaks during a meeting with Polish President Karol Nawrocki in the Oval Office of the White House, Wednesday, Sept. 3, 2025, in Washington. (AP Photo/Evan Vucci)

The first jobs report since President Donald Trump fired Erika McEntarfer as the commissioner of the Bureau of Labor Statistics showed numbers continuing to slow.

Just 22,000 jobs were added by employers in August, a drop from 79,000 in July. Unemployment also bumped up to 4.3%.

The July jobs report had been so dissatisfying to the president that he announced through Truth Social that McEntarfer was being let go from her position to make room for someone more “qualified.” Trump accused the former commissioner of faking numbers to make him look bad.

“I have directed my Team to fire this Biden Political Appointee, IMMEDIATELY. She will be replaced with someone much more competent and qualified,” he wrote.

The July jobs growth was the weakest since December 2020.

Trump has since nominated EJ Antoni from the Heritage Foundation as the new commissioner to lead the Bureau of Labor Statistics. The current acting commissioner is William Wiatrowski.

Antoni has questioned the reliability of data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics, telling Fox News that he plans to suspend jobs reports until the data-gathering can be “corrected.”

“How on earth are businesses supposed to plan – or how is the Fed supposed to conduct monetary policy – when they don’t know how many jobs are being added or lost in our economy? It’s a serious problem that needs to be fixed immediately,” he said. “Until it is corrected, the BLS should suspend issuing the monthly job reports but keep publishing the more accurate, though less timely, quarterly data.”