Donald Trump 'In Denial' About Job Figures, Economy—Nate Silver
By: Peter Aitken (Newsweek)
S E E D E D C O N T E N T
Pollster Nate Silver on Sunday called out President Donald Trump's reaction to the latest data about jobs, accusing him of "denialism" and warning that it won't help him fix the nation's slowing economy.
"Firing the BLS commissioner won't prevent the effects of tariffs. But it will reduce American economic leadership and increase uncertainty for businesses, workers and investors," Silver wrote in his newsletter, referring to Trump's decision to fire Erika McEntarfer, commissioner of the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS), after the agency published a weaker-than-expected jobs report for July.
Silver stressed that U.S. economic data remains reliable, as it is meticulously documented and regularly revised "because measuring something as complex as the modern American economy is an incredibly challenging task."
"I'm not sure exactly where firing the BLS commissioner ranks on the list of Trump-related outrages," Silver wrote. "Even if Congress does its job and McEntarfer replaced with another competent successor, this could have a chilling effect on BLS and other government agencies to operate independently."
Newsweek has reached out to the White House by email on Sunday outside of normal business hours for comment.
Why It Matters
Trump's decision to fire McEntarfer caused shockwaves, with economists and Democratic lawmakers criticizing the move. Some have accused Trump of trying to "kill the messenger" over heavy revisions to May and June's job numbers, which removed 258,000 jobs previously announced in those months.
This followed the July jobs report, which reported 73,000 jobs added, which was well short of the projected 100,000 jobs. The unemployment rate also rose to 4.2 percent.
The firing of a high-level labor statistician after the release of adverse economic data raised alarms about the politicization of nonpartisan agencies and reliability of official U.S. economic statistics. Experts and lawmakers stressed that the integrity of the BLS is central to public trust and informed economic decision-making.
What To Know
Silver, the founder of 538 and one of the most prominent polling experts in the U.S., wrote in his newsletter that July's jobs report has suggested a slowing economy and "Trump is in denial about it."
"Each monthly payrolls figure is actually revised three times: once in each of the first two months after initial publication (so July's 73,000 figure will be re-reported in August and then again in September) and then again each January as part of the BLS's annual benchmark revisions," Silver wrote.
He argued that the jobs report often only receives attention at the initial announcement, with politicians and news media treating the figure as a simple "beat" or "bust" factor relative to the initial estimate, and that not enough attention is given to the regular cycle of "large revisions and the difficulties in estimation."
"All of this feels a little too familiar: it's the same thing that happens when news organizations breathlessly report polling data without considering the margin of error and other challenges for surveys," Silver wrote.
He noted that revisions during every month of Trumps' second administration have seen negative revisions, which he wrote is "actually common enough" and that it's more important to look at the trend of revision from month-to-month.
Those trends help experts and analysts understand if they're seeing sampling errors or statistical biases in the numbers, which can occur also in the event of an economy facing "some sort of trauma or disruption."
Silver also wrote that any attempt to undermine Trump would be better executed by reporting the lower estimates instead of revising them down later, since "revisions don't usually get as much media attention as the headline figures," and that "the May and June revisions are relatively pedestrian."
"The largest change ever to an initial jobs figure ever after two months came in March 2020 as the pandemic hit American shores; initially reported as a job loss of 700,000, it was later revised to nearly 1.4 million instead," he wrote.
President Donald Trump departs the White House en route to Bedminster, New Jersey, on August 1 in Washington, D.C.President Donald Trump departs the White House en route to Bedminster, New Jersey, on August 1 in Washington, D.C.Andrew Thomas/Middle East Images/AFP via Getty Images
What People Are Saying
President Donald Trump wrote in a Truth Social post on Sunday: "Head of the Bureau of of Labor Statistics did the same thing just before the Presidential Election, when she lifted the numbers for jobs to an all time high. I then won the Election, anyway, and she readjusted the numbers downward, calling it a mistake, of almost one million jobs. A SCAM! She did it again, with another massive 'correction,' and got FIRED! She had the biggest miscalculations in over 50 years."
Trump also wrote on Truth Social on Friday: "McEntarfer said there were only 73,000 Jobs added (a shock!) but, more importantly, that a major mistake was made by them, 258,000 Jobs downward, in the prior two months. Similar things happened in the first part of the year, always to the negative. The Economy is BOOMING under 'TRUMP' despite a Fed that also plays games, this time with Interest Rates, where they lowered them twice, and substantially, just before the Presidential Election, I assume in the hopes of getting 'Kamala' elected - How did that work out? Jerome 'Too Late' Powell should also be put "out to pasture." Thank you for your attention to this matter!"
Ernie Tedeschi, the former head of Yale University's Budget Lab, wrote on X on Friday about McEntarfer's firing: "I've worked closely with Erika. I know of no economist who is more data-focused & devoted to truth in statistics. She never shied from speaking truth to power when the data were disappointing. Nothing would be worse for US credibility than political meddling in our economic data."
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Trump can be in denial about the economic statistics all he wants - in private. In public he should keep his demented beliefs to himself. Else his word will become more mud than it already is. No one but his cult can believe him about anything. How can this even be possible in America with our national "leader" ?
One thing Trump was right about is that the same BLS commissioner gave Harris/Biden a glowing Jobs report just before the election and then revised it by 818,000 fewer jobs right after the election. I don't necessarily agree with firing her, but I do understand why he did it.
Revised Data Exposes “Overstated” Job Creation Claims by Harris-Biden Admin, Revealing 818,000 Nonexistent Jobs
Incorrect. That adjustment, and the story you linked, were published in August of last year. That’s two and a half months before the election - not after it.
[deleted][✘]
Yes because we must quash free speech when we don’t agree with said speech.
There is no such things as "Trump Derangement Syndrome". Trump being deranged is a thing though.
Its interesting how folks can never actually defend all the insane things Trump says or does, but they are always ready to attack his critics.
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The rest of this thread was removed for meta
Trump firing Erika McEntarfer as commissioner of the Bureau of Labor Statistics is Exhibit #1 for that.
Is it? Or is it firing someone not doing their job.
Time will tell.
I have not heard anyone disputing the numbers, just republicans who do not like the numbers.
Yes, it is. "Everyone knows it and you know it, too." -DJT
Now you believe what he says? Interesting.
Where did I say something as ridiculous as I believe anything Trump says? That quote is there because it would be something you can relate to.
Try again. He's not disputing the numbers, just the methods.
Nope, he's saying the numbers are not as accurate as they need to be because of the methods. They need to fix the process to get better numbers.
“He's not disputing the numbers, just the methods.”
So the methods are faulty but produce reliable numbers? Lol.
They (BLS) are "disputing" (correcting) their own numbers. That's what a "revision" is.
Revisions are normal. Revisions this size are not.
The preliminary annual benchmark revision for 2024 was -818,000. That was later revised to -598,000. That's still the largest since 2009.... when we were in the midst of the worst financial crisis since the Great Depression, the banks almost failed, and nobody knew what was happening from one day to the next.
Everybody who follows financial markets relies on this data. We all expect it to be revised later, but we expect that the original numbers are at least reasonably close. Recently they've been so far off so often that something needed to be done.
Any investigation into any revisions Trump doesnt like would be fatally tainted by his stench before it even got underway. There is no such thing as an independent investigation in the trump administration.
Possible. Numbers have not been shown to be wrong.
So the numbers aren’t wrong? Did they revise the numbers because they were correct in the first place?
The real question is how close statistically were they to the original numbers.
“Numbers have not been shown to be wrong.”
So why the need for any revisions at all? Let alone some massive revisions?
They aren’t even the BLS’s numbers. They don’t create the numbers. They report the results of surveys, and the information trickles in because it’s not like taxes where you have to file by a certain date or it’s a crime. I believe they still make revisions up to 5 years later.
There’s no evidence that any of these published reports have anything at all to do with the political agenda of someone at BLS.
They are. The BLS publishes employment numbers monthly.
Please cite me suggesting otherwise.
The fact remains that the initial numbers have been substantially less accurate over the last 18 months and required significantly larger revisions.
This has significant impact on the actions of the Federal Reserve, and therefore has significant impact on capital markets. It is a key data point for the entire economy.
Yes. As I said, they don’t create the data. They just collect and publish it. The BLS conducts surveys, collects data, and publishes the results. When they get more complete data, they revise the report. But they are not the source for the data.
You write in support of Trump’s firing of this commissioner. Here is his accusation :
That accusation from him, and his order to fire the commissioner on that basis , is why we are here talking about it. However, you seem to support the decision and the justification for it.
The “something” that was done was that she was fired. The president accused her of fraud, and fired her for that reason. And you are here, writing in support of that “something.”
[deleted] [✘] I said, "Numbers have not been shown to be wrong".
I'm not sure what point you're attempting to make here. They publish the report, and over the last 18 months those have been substantially less accurate than they were previously.
That's not a citation. That's an inference. And you've done it poorly. I support firing her because under her tenure the numbers have become significantly less reliable. I've said exactly that.
So despite my detailed post telling you exactly why I agree with the decision, you choose to fabricate your own theory. That's a bit silly.
You made that up on your own, despite my multiple posts with details about why I support the decision.
Obviously. And it was the correct decision. The Federal Reserve governors make trillion dollar decisions that affect all of our lives based in large part on employment numbers from the BLS. They cannot be stupidly inaccurate over and over again.
I gave up listening to what Donald Trump says long ago. That's a fool's errand. I've said for years that I don't give a shit what he says and other people pay far too much attention. What matters is what he does, and it usually doesn't actually matter why. If he fired her for the wrong reasons... OK. I don't care. She needed to go.
How could you possibly know that? Is there an objective standard you can compare it to? Even if some of the corrections are bigger than we have previously seen, that could have multiple causes.
Perhaps the revisions are more thorough than previous ones, and we’re actually getting better data than we used to.
Or perhaps businesses and homeowners who previously responded to these surveys are now less cooperative for some reason.
What we don’t have, is any evidence that the commissioner “faked” the numbers. We also don’t have any evidence from you that she deserved to be fired.
The Federal Reserve is a deliberate, patient body. The decisions they make are not snap decisions, urgently made in response to the latest BLS report. They take their time, look at revisions of the reports, and make moves based on fundamental trends. So, if it takes a few months to get a clearer snapshot of the economy, that is a feature, not a bug.
Very basic statistics.
Average revisions under her tenure were 30-50% higher than in the 20 years prior to her arrival.
It probably does have multiple causes, and the most probable explanation involves changes in policy or procedures under her tenure.
You'll notice I've made no such accusation.
We absolutely do. Look at the numbers. You can't be wrong by that much more than everybody else and expect to keep the job.
Obviously. Nevertheless, they use these numbers. Wildly inaccurate data is never a feature. It's always a bug.
Not if Trump has anything to do with it.
The sucessor will be someone who has to remove shoes and socks so they can count past 10
So Eric? As high as Junior usually is, I don't think he could find his shoes to take them off.
On Friday, Donald Trump fired Erika McEntarfer, the head of the Bureau of Labor Statistics, for the crime of doing her job. Earlier that day, the BLMS had released new jobs numbers that showed anemic growth in July—just 73,000 jobs were added—and revised numbers for May and June that showed decreases in total jobs for those months. Overall, the picture was bleak: Just 106,000 jobs added over three months. The president, unsurprisingly, was furious, and as such immediately began alleging an elaborate and nonsensical conspiracy to undermine his own administration. “Important numbers like this must be fair and accurate, they can’t be manipulated for political purposes,” Trump wrote on his bespoke social network Truth Social.
McEntarfer wasn’t the only federal employee in his sights; he also took the opportunity to lambast Fed chair Jerome Powell, who has long been a target of his ire. “The Economy is BOOMING under TRUMP,” he wrote in a wild run-on sentence with a variety of punctuation, “despite a Fed that also plays games, this time with Interest Rates, where they lowered them twice, and substantially, just before the Presidential Election, I assume in the hopes of getting ‘Kamala’ elected - How did that work out? Jerome ‘Too Late’ Powell should also be put ‘out to pasture.” (Powell was appointed by Trump in 2018.)
Trump is right, obviously, to be upset about the jobs numbers. They’re really bad—the worst numbers since the height of the Covid pandemic. Before that, the last time there were jobs numbers this bad was during the Great Recession. But Trump, although he will never admit it, has no one to blame for the state of the economy but himself. His decision to fire McEntarfer—and, as a result, cast doubt on the reliability of all future data, not just from the Bureau of Labor Statistics but from any economic agency—will only make things worse.
After six months of deportations, purges, and chaos, it’s easy to forget that the primary reason voters sent Donald Trump back to the White House was their widespread displeasure about post-pandemic inflation , which they blamed on Joe Biden. Prices ballooned during his presidency thanks to a variety of factors—shifts in consumer demand, supply chain disruption, even the war in Ukraine—few of which he had the administration had any real control over. By the time they stabilized, it was too late for Biden. By the end of his first year in office, a solid majority had concluded that inflation was his fault. It wasn’t—but that hardly mattered.
Trump won in large part because he was in charge of the economy the last time it was good—in the period leading up the pandemic —and because, for whatever reason, voters didn’t blame him when Covid-19 caused it to collapse. There were certainly other factors that played a role in his 2024 victory—Biden’s age, his steadfast support for Israel’s genocidal war in Gaza, Kamala Harris’s decision to run a cautious campaign despite having only 107 days to press her case. But inflation was the primary driver. A lot of voters hated the Biden economy and didn’t give the administration credit for getting inflation under control. They wanted something different. They got it.
Despite voters’ dissatisfaction with it, the economy Trump inherited from Biden was actually pretty good : Unemployment was low and inflation was under control. In six months, Trump has done everything possible to destroy it. Next Friday will mark the third installment of “Liberation Day,” the nonsensical tariff regime he has imposed on most of the rest of the world, hitting key allies and trading partners like Canada and the European Union particularly hard.
These tariffs have caused the stock market to crash (though it has subsequently rebounded, sort of ), prices to rise , and have ruptured a world economic order that America built for its own benefit. Many of our closest allies are now rethinking their relationships with the United States. Meanwhile, Trump has brayed about tariffs raking in $150 billion in revenue—a number that sounds big until you remember that it is literally a tax on American citizens. In just six months, the economy looks a lot like it did during the first half of Biden’s term: layoffs, inflation, instability. The big difference is that without Trump—and specifically without Trump’s tariffs—none of this would be happening.
The firing of McEntarfer makes a bad situation significantly worse. It’s hard to think of a more unnecessary or more brutal act of economic self-destruction than, in one swoop, to shatter the integrity of the economic data produced by the federal government. If McEntarfer is removed—and it looks like she will be—then every statistic produced during the rest of Trump’s term will be suspect. It was already hard to run a business, given the general instability and the insanity of Trump’s tariffs. Now, given the lack of reliable economic data, it will be even harder.
Five years ago, at the height of the pandemic, Trump attempted to pressure agencies to lower the number of reported Covid-19 cases—all so he could seem like he had things under control. He’s now attempting to manipulate jobs numbers in a similar way. It didn’t work then. It won’t work now.
This whole outrage shows the absolute retardation of the left and their media sycophants, in what job can you be wrong so often and by so much and expect to keep your job? other than a weatherman? FFS her reports have been revised so often by such huge numbers she should have been fired months ago. Democrats fighting for mediocrity and incompetence, no wonder their choice was Kamala.
Trump was very happy with her until the news got bad. He thinks he is king of the USA and can dictate what every official says or does.
He is the head of the executive branch and they serve at his pleasure, I see you completely ignored her incompetence. Why can't they get accurate info John? what other job in history would allow you to be so bad at it?
I dont think she was incompetent. Trumps opinion on it is worthless.
So getting the numbers consistently wrong by 20% or more isn't incompetent in your world?
In June she was off by 90%, when your only job is to produce accurate numbers and you are off by large margins consistently, you are by definition incompetent.
But the facts do not. Because the 'facts' don't work for him, those reporting the facts are a threat to him which is why he fired Erika McEntarfer. He doesn't want people to do their jobs because that would expose him. He wants chaos and incompetence so that when it all burns to the ground he has plenty of scape goats to blame it all on.
Than he should have kept the stupid piece of shit, She was off by 90% FFS and this isn't the first time she has completely hosed the numbers, why do you embrace that level of incompetence?
Please do link your claims, I can't find anything from an actual reputable source that supports your claims so until you provide some actual legitimate evidence of incompetence there's simply nothing to debate.
What I did find from the hilarious attempt of this moronic administration to cover their asses was the "Whitehouse.gov" claims which basically make a bunch of unsubstantiated hearsay claims against McEntarfer about how they believe the BLS did all these bad things or didn't respond fast enough to Republican legislators requests.
Here are the litany of accusations that they frame McEntarfer for:
Talk about a bullshit partisan hit piece. I can't even really believe this was our government that put out such a horse shit COA document after they got caught firing someone who didn't gargle their Fuhrers ball sweat gleefully enough like the rest of the captive government employees are supposed to be doing.
They hope she was off by 90%.
She started in 2024, do your own research....
She was and more previously...
That’s actually not her job. The BLS doesn’t produce numbers. Those numbers are submitted to BLS, which then reports the numbers. When they get additional numbers, they revise their reports.
Actually you are 100% wrong, the BLS solicits those numbers from industry, their methodology is flawed due to incompetence and a lack of innovation. Their motto should be, we are incompetent and not changing.
How did their methodology suddenly become incompetent? The fact is that if this report had been good for Trump it would be being talked about positively by MAGA. Same methodology but a different more pleasant result.
People see right through all the right wing bullshit about this.
That's actually a very good question.
We have irrefutable data telling us the numbers have been less reliable over the last 18 months than they were in the 20 years before that. That's not the sort of thing that just happens by itself. So what changed?
About what?
Yes, I know. That’s how a survey is conducted. That’s what I have been saying.
What would you like them to do instead?
BLS revises reports all the time. This is not a new thing. Trump has got people believing they just invent these numbers. That just not how it works.
So as long as their numbers are always wrong and have to be corrected you are okay with them?
The commissioner didn’t create the system. If you have a better method for developing an understanding of jobs in America, then by all means, let’s hear it. Any attempt to measure the state of the economy and jobs is going to be an estimate. Anyone who demands perfect accuracy is a fool.
Stop with the hyperbole. The numbers being discussed here are far, far from perfection or an expectation of such.
Then how can you complain about accuracy? Or the lack of it? You can’t define it, and you claim you don’t expect it. So what’s the problem?
lol …. My comment is clear enough. Your attempts at obfuscating it are noted though.
Like you’re taking notes. ROFL!
thehill.com /opinion/campaign/5429516-trump-confabulation-dementia-signs/
Trump’s mental decline is undeniable — so what now?
Chris Truax, opinion contributor 6-7 minutes 8/1/2025
“Confabulation.” It’s a word you are going to be hearing a lot in the coming months.
President Trump has always been willing to mislead people when it was to his advantage. Even his supporters recognize this. Hence the famous admonition to “take Trump seriously, not literally .”
But what Trump is doing now is something different . Confabulation is sometimes called “honest lying,” because the person doing it genuinely believes what he’s saying, even if it is obviously and patently false. A person confabulates when they are telling completely invented stories that don’t provide them any particular tangible benefit. In other words, it’s not like lying to try and get out of a speeding ticket.
Confabulation isn’t misremembering a date or forgetting something. The mistakes of memory we are all subject to become confabulation when people remember false information in vivid detail — detail so vivid and complete that people who don’t know otherwise often believe what they are hearing is true.
In older people, confabulation is one of the clearest early signs of dementia . The day you witness someone confabulate is often the day you are forced to admit to yourself that a beloved parent needs help, and that all the little slips and oddities you’ve been seeing can no longer be rationalized away.
For Trump, the day we could no longer pretend everything is fine came on July 15, when he told a lengthy story about his uncle, John Trump, who he claimed taught at MIT and held three degrees in “nuclear, chemical, and math.” His uncle, according to Trump, once told him how he had taught Ted Kaczynski, the Unabomber , and how very smart Kaczynski was.
Trump’s uncle was indeed a professor at MIT, but everything else in this story is pure confabulation. Trump’s uncle didn’t have degrees in “nuclear, chemical, and math” — he had degrees in electrical engineering and physics. And Kaczynski did not go to MIT at all — he went to Harvard .
But most telling of all, it is categorically impossible for Trump’s uncle to have told him any such story. Kaczynski became publicly known as the Unabomber when he was arrested in 1996. Trump’s uncle, the MIT professor, died in 1985 . In other words, Trump’s uncle could not have told him the story because there was, literally, no story to tell during his lifetime.
Once you have seen that Donald Trump is confabulating, it cannot be unseen — and all sorts of other mildly disturbing incidents suddenly fall into place.
Difficulty with mathematical concepts is another early warning sign of dementia. Now watch Trump attempting to explain how he is going to make drug prices go down by “1,000 percent, 600 percent, 500 percent, 1,500 percent.” That’s complete nonsense , unless drug companies will be paying patients to accept prescriptions, since reducing drug prices by 100 percent would mean they were free. Certainly, someone who got a business degree from Wharton and has spent his life running a company would know how percentages work.
Or take his insistence that former President Obama and his FBI director, James Comey, made up the Epstein files, even though they were long out of office by the time Epstein was most recently arrested in 2019. Again, that’s very troubling, because being unable to correctly process when past events took place is a common feature in confabulation. The same goes for being unable to remember that he himself appointed Jerome Powell as the chair of the federal reserve. And then, of course, there are all the little lapses in judgment that Trump has been displaying recently.
I have opposed Trump since he came down that famous escalator in 2015. But I want to step away from partisan sniping for a moment. I know a lot of people genuinely love the man, even if I don’t. I recognize how hard this must be for them. After the death of a child, watching someone you love and respect struggle with dementia may be one of the worst experiences a person can have, whether it’s a parent or a president.
But when the time comes, it’s something that must be faced squarely. That goes double when we are talking about the president.
If you aren’t comfortable with labeling this as dementia, that’s fine. But there is no question that the president — the man tasked with making critical life and death decisions for both the country and the world — is struggling with mathematical concepts, has vivid “memories” that are not rooted in reality and has an increasingly foggy grasp of past events that did happen. That’s not a medical diagnosis. These are facts we can see for ourselves and we all know, even those of us who voted for Trump three times, that this can’t be allowed to continue.
Whatever dementia issues Joe Biden may have , there is no denying that his staff was superb at managing them and protecting both Biden and the country. Trump, however, doesn’t have those guardrails. That’s one of the reasons we are seeing what we are seeing. Can you imagine Pete Hegseth or Kristi Noem managing Trump’s dementia or even simply telling him “no” and threatening to resign?
Given this lack of independence in Trump’s Cabinet, I’m not sure what the ultimate solution is. But I know that the first step is for Trump’s most loyal supporters to admit, even if only to themselves, that there is a problem, just as Biden’s supporters did for him.
Donald Trump is showing all the signs of suffering from dementia. If this were a neighbor, a parent, or a family friend, you would have no trouble seeing it. We should not turn our heads just because it is the president.
Chris Truax is an appellate attorney who served as Southern California chair for John McCain’s primary campaign in 2008.
Trump has spent the morning attacking the You Tube personality Charlemagne the God, and Taylor Swift, among others. Maybe Taylor Swift once kicked him in the nuts when he tried to make a move on her.
Don't know if Trump is in denial but Trump is definitely attempting to control the narrative. Politicizing economic data isn't unprecedented or even unusual. Everyone ignores that the expected job numbers for July was only 100,000 so a miss of 27,000 jobs isn't as serious as is being politically portrayed. July and August are typically slow months for job creation anyway.
And we don't know if or how much the expansion of Artificial Intelligence affected the job numbers. We know that rapid adoption of AI by businesses is complicating expectations for job creation. AI is a disruptive technology so uncertainty in predicting job creation is unavoidable.
aka twisting or obfuscating facts to fit a predetermined narrative of competence and growth to match what he promised while still not being able to actually deliver on those promises. He promised them a freshwater paradise oasis but all they're getting is a trickle-down shower of Trump ball sweat and he's trying to convince them it's the best sweetest rain that will eventually fill their metaphorically dry lakes and ponds. The rest of us who can tell what it is and where it came from can but shake our heads at those dancing around with their faces raised to the sky and their mouths open gargling in joy and delighting in the deluge.
Isn't that the motivation for the hullabaloo over missing expectations for job creation?
What's the alternative? What is the blatherskite opposition promising? Those opposed to Trump are celebrating a bad job report according to their politicized narrative. What can the electorate expect from those who delight in a bad jobs report?
Those who throw their own guy under bus doesn't seem like a trustworthy source for alternatives.
It's not celebrating, it's a very simple "We told you so."
Perhaps, not playing a shell game with the American economy with outlandish tariffs being threatened at every turn and American companies not knowing what their potential immediate future product costs will be in an unpredictable financial market? That would be a start.
Market stability by being predictable, safe and steady, just like what saved the economy back in 2009 after Republicans had been in charge got 8 years.
No one is "delighted" that the jobs report is bad, though I'm sure some find a certain satisfaction due to their predictions being proved correct.
Here's the situation in a nutshell...
"I'm warning you, if you do X, then Y will happen!"
"Nuh Uh!"
They do X... Y happens...
"I told you that would happen!"
"Oh, look at you, celebrating Y! I'm sure you just love Y! Why do you want to force Y on us?! Why are you such horrible people?!"
Yup, that's the way dishonest partisans play the game but no one with more than half a brain is buying their bullshit.
The reality is that those who supported such unwise policies created this mess and now they're panicking and trying to lay the blame on anyone other than their spray tan Savior. They can't help themselves, they're not smart enough to support intelligent fiscal policies, they prefer bullshit rhetoric like how Trump will reduce drug prices by 1500%, Trump sycophants just love having their ears tickled even if it is a feather coated in bullshit that's doing the tickling.
Trump hasn't been in office long enough to much affect the economy
Trump said he was affecting the economy before he even got elected.
And you believe him...
The stock market and the economy are very different things.
The stock market is not "the economy", but the companies listed make up part of a subset of the overall economy. The two are interrelated while having differences. The stock market and stock market reactions can provide clues about the underlying economy. In the view of some if not most investors, the stock market serves as a leading inidcator for the economy.
Do you doubt that Trump claiming he affected the stock market was a way for him to claim he was benefitting the economy?