It has not been a brilliant weekend for Donald Trump. On Sunday administration officials fanned out on US political shows to defend the president’s policies after a bruising week of poor economic, trade and employment numbers that culminated with the firing of labor statistics chief Erika McEntarfer.
US trade representative Jamieson Greer said Trump has “real concerns” about the jobs numbers that extend beyond Friday’s report that showed the national economy added 73,000 jobs in July, far below expectations. Job growth numbers were revised down by 285,000 for the two previous months as well.
On CBS News’s Face the Nation, Greer defended Trump’s decision to fire McEntarfer, a respected statistician, saying: “You want to be able to have somewhat reliable numbers. There are always revisions, but sometimes you see these revisions go in really extreme ways.”
It comes as the president himself lashed out at Senate Democratic leader Chuck Schumer on social media, telling him: “GO TO HELL!” after a Senate standoff over confirmations.
‘The president is the president’
US trade representative Jamieson Greer has defended the firing of labor statistics chief Erika McEntarfer. “The president is the president. He can choose who works in the executive branch,” he said on Face the Nation.
Greer was among a host of Trump administration officials who were deployed to defend Trump after a week of bruising economic numbers.
William Beach, who served as Trump’s commissioner of the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) in his first presidency, warned that McEntarfer’s dismissal would undermine confidence in the quality of US economic data.
President tells Chuck Schumer to ‘GO TO HELL’
The US Senate left Washington DC on Saturday night for its month-long August recess without a deal to advance dozens of Donald Trump’s nominees, calling it quits after days of contentious bipartisan negotiations and the president taking to social media to tell Senate Democratic leader Chuck Schumer to “GO TO HELL!”
Without a deal in hand, Republicans say they may try to change Senate rules when they return in September to speed up the pace of confirmations. Trump has been pressuring senators to move quickly as Democrats blocked more nominees than usual this year, denying any fast unanimous consent votes and forcing roll calls on each one, a lengthy process that can take several days per nominee.
Trump administration denies daily quota for immigration arrests
In a new court filing, attorneys for the Trump administration denied the existence of a daily quota for immigration arrests, despite reports and prior statements from White House officials about pursuing a goal of at least 3,000 deportations or deportation arrests per day.
Lawyers representing the US justice department said that the Department of Homeland Security had confirmed that “neither Ice leadership nor its field offices have been directed to meet any numerical quota or target for arrests, detentions, removals, field encounters, or any other operational activities that Ice or its components undertake in the course of enforcing federal immigration law.”
Senate confirms Trump ally Jeanine Pirro as top federal prosecutor for DC
The US Senate has confirmed Jeanine Pirro – a former Fox News host and staunch Donald Trump ally who boosted lies that he lost the 2020 presidential race because of electoral fraudsters – as the top federal prosecutor for the nation’s capital.
Pirro – a former New York state district attorney and county judge who joined Fox News in 2011 – was confirmed on Saturday in a 50-45 vote along party lines.
In a statement issued by Pirro after the vote, the Republican said she was “blessed” to have been confirmed as the US attorney for Washington DC. “Get ready for a real crime fighter,” said Pirro’s statement, which called the US attorney’s office she had been confirmed to lead the largest in the country.
What else happened today:
The Smithsonian says it will restore Trump impeachment exhibits in “coming weeks”.
Bizarre public appearances again cast doubt on Trump’s mental acuity.
Legal cases could prise open Epstein cache despite Trump’s blocking effort.
Texas Democrats are fleeing the state to prevent a vote on Monday that could see five new Republican-leaning seats created in the House of Representatives.
Catching up? Here’s what happened on 2 August.
