A group of Republican senators wants to know how President Biden’s Department of Labor severely overestimated the number of new jobs created over the past year — after the agency made its largest downward revision to US payroll figures since 2009.
The revised figures from the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS), released last week, suggested that there were actually 818,000 fewer jobs during the 12 months ending in March than initially reported — an indication that the economy may be less robust than the White House is saying.
That means that the actual job growth during that period was likely around 30% less than first thought.
While the BLS often revises its job estimates long after the initial numbers make the headlines, the lawmakers said the eye-bulging adjustment was unusually large.
Sen. Roger Marshall (R-Kan.), who is leading the charge, said the public deserves an investigation into whether the numbers were intentionally fudged to boost the Harris-Biden administration.
“Using taxpayer dollars to mislead the public for political gain is an outrageous betrayal of trust and one of the reasons Americans have lost all faith in this Administration,” Marshall told The Post.
“Manipulating the numbers to spin a false narrative while people are struggling to afford gas and groceries is not only dishonest — it’s insulting.”
The Post has not seen evidence that political motivations were at play in the massive revisions.
The Kansas Republican was joined by Sens. Ted Budd (R-NC), Rick Scott (R-Fla.), Markwayne Mullin (R-Okla.) and Marsha Blackburn (R-Tenn.).
“These misleading numbers created a false impression for the public and cast doubt on the validity of the Bureau’s accuracy and legitimacy,” the senators wrote in a letter to acting Labor Secretary Julie Su.
“As we approach the presidential election in approximately 70 days, the state of the economy is one of the major issues on [Americans’] minds. There should be no confusion when it comes to evaluating the health of our economy,” the senators added.
This year’s revision marks the largest of its kind since 2009 when job estimates were overstated by 824,000.
In total, the BLS is estimating that 2.1 million jobs were added to the US economy during the 12-month period ending March 2024, rather than the 2.9 million previously reported — a downward revision of 28%.
Marshall and the other Republicans want to know how many jobs were recouped from the COVID-19 pandemic, how many new jobs were full-time and part-time, as well as how many new jobs were in government positions.
The senators gave Su until Sept. 9 to respond to their request.
Other Republicans have raised alarm about the corrections, including former President Donald Trump.
“MASSIVE SCANDAL! The Harris-Biden Administration has been caught fraudulently manipulating Job Statistics to hide the true extent of the Economic Ruin they have inflicted upon America,” Trump alleged in a Truth Social post last week.
“New Data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics shows that the Administration PADDED THE NUMBERS with an extra 818,000 Jobs that DO NOT EXIST, AND NEVER DID.”
Su has remained acting labor secretary since March of last year despite her nomination stalling out in the Senate due to opposition from Sen. Joe Manchin (I-WV) and all 49 Republicans.
