Trump Defends His Controversial Firing

President Trump is doubling down on his rationale for firing a top statistician in the Labor Department. In a Monday morning post on Truth Social, the president again asserted that the numbers were cooked in a surprisingly weak jobs report that came out on Friday. In the wake of the report, he fired the commissioner of the Bureau of Labor Statistics, Erika McEntarfer.

• "Last weeks Job's Report was RIGGED, just like the numbers prior to the Presidential Election were Rigged," Trump wrote. "That's why, in both cases, there was massive, record setting revisions, in favor of the Radical Left Democrats. Those big adjustments were made to cover up, and level out, the FAKE political numbers that were CONCOCTED in order to make a great Republican Success look less stellar!!!"

• Defense: Trump promised to pick an "exceptional" replacement for McEntarfer. Over the weekend, National Economic Council director Kevin Hassett defended the firing and said the president "wants his own people there."
• 'Authoritarian:' However, Trump's critics continue to criticize the move, with former Treasury chief Larry Summers saying that firing the head of an agency because you don't like the numbers "is what happens in authoritarian countries, not democratic ones." Summers said there was "no conceivable way" the stats were rigged because they are put together by "hundreds of people following detailed procedures that are in manuals," reports the Wall Street Journal.