By most measures, the latest jobs report was quite good: The U.S. economy added another 263,000 jobs in September, bringing the new total for the year to roughly 3.78 million. This is a very strong total more in line with what we’d expect to see in a full year, not nine months into the year. It also outpaces any individual year from Donald Trump’s term in the White House.
The same report showed the unemployment rate falling to 3.5% — matching a 50-year low.
In fact, the latest figures from the Bureau of Labor Statistics were so good that the major Wall Street indexes suffered big losses on Friday: Strong job growth made it more likely that the Federal Reserve will raise interest rates again, pushing the national closer to a recession as part of a counter-inflationary effort.
It was against this backdrop that the Republican National Committee issued a news release, trying to convince people that the job totals only looked encouraging.
“The economy added just 263,000 jobs in September, making this the worst jobs report of the year and the second fewest jobs added since the COVID recovery began.”
First, in Trump’s first three years, over the course of 36 months, the U.S. economy fell short of 263,000 jobs a total of 32 times. If the RNC expects the public to see the most recent jobs report as somehow subpar, then Trump — and every Republican who insists that Trump was God’s gift to the economy — has some explaining to do.
Second, the data from September will be revised, and it’s entirely possible that the tally will end up looking even more impressive.
But at least the RNC was willing to acknowledge the existence of the jobs report with an odd and unpersuasive news release — which is more than we can say about congressional Republican leaders.
In keeping with the recent trend, House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy and Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell responded to the job numbers by saying literally nothing about the good news. No news releases, no tweets and no public comments. They literally found themselves speechless.
Circling back to our recent coverage, these same GOP leaders were similarly at a loss for words a month ago. And the month before that. And the month before that. And the month before that. And the month before that. In fact, McCarthy hasn’t issued a statement in response to any U.S job data since January, when he released this gem lamenting news he considered “disappointing.” “Our economy should be soaring right now, but the policies of this administration continue to stifle growth and hold back American businesses and workers. … In less than 12 months, the Biden administration has sabotaged what should have been a V-shaped recovery.”
The House GOP leader was referring to jobs data from December 2021 — a month that we now know saw job creation at 588,000 as the unemployment rate improved sharply. No one rooting for an economic recovery had reason to be “disappointed” by any of this. McCarthy, of course, had pounced on the data before it was revised in an encouraging direction, but more importantly, the California Republican was also drawing an unmistakable connection: The Biden administration and its policies are responsible for the job market. It’s a common line: The Republican National Committee also connected Biden’s agenda and job growth over and over and over again. In the upper chamber, McConnell’s Senate website last year blamed “persistent unemployment” on Democrats. But by that reasoning, shouldn’t Americans give Democrats credit for rapid and historic job growth? If Biden and his party are responsible for economic developments, how is it that this is no longer applicable when the economy creates more than 10.5 million jobs since the start of last year?
Steve Benen is a producer for "The Rachel Maddow Show," the editor of MaddowBlog and an MS NOW political contributor. He's also the bestselling author of "Ministry of Truth: Democracy, Reality, and the Republicans' War on the Recent Past."
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