“It’s Totally Expected”: Trump Shrugs Off Historic Unemployment Numbers

“There’s no surprise. Everybody knows it.”

Stefani Reynolds/ZUMA

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After spending nearly 20 minutes lashing out at familiar targets related to the Russia investigation, President Donald Trump used his appearance on Fox & Friends Friday morning to play down the significance of the newest jobs report, which revealed the US economy lost a staggering 20.5 million jobs in April, the highest level of unemployment since the Great Depression. 

“It’s fully expected, there’s no surprise,” Trump said just as the Bureau of Labor Statistics released the grim numbers. “Everybody knows that.” He did not offer any messages of support or concern for the millions of Americans now unemployed.

“Somebody said, ‘Oh, look at this, even the Democrats aren’t blaming me for that,'” he continued. In fact, Democrats, as well as anti-Trump conservatives, have laid the blame for the tanked economy directly on his doorstep, arguing that a more aggressive and systematic approach to containing the spread of the novel coronavirus would have lessened the current economic catastrophe. It was just the latest example of the increasing disconnect between the stark reality of Trump’s botched coronavirus response and the magical thinking required to buoy the president’s campaign to present a rosy view of his administration’s performance amid the ongoing crisis.

Moreover, Trump’s insistence that Friday’s jobs report had been fully anticipated fails to square with his previous predictions that the crisis would “disappear” like a “miracle.” Nor do they track with top economic adviser Larry Kudlow’s forecast back in February that the US would avoid an “economy tragedy.”

“Those jobs will all be back and they’ll be back very soon,” Trump insisted, again ignoring warnings from economists that a recovery is nowhere close. “People are ready to go, we’ve got to get it open.

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THE FACTS SPEAK FOR THEMSELVES.

At least we hope they will, because that’s our approach to raising the $350,000 in online donations we need right now—during our high-stakes December fundraising push.

It’s the most important month of the year for our fundraising, with upward of 15 percent of our annual online total coming in during the final week—and there’s a lot to say about why Mother Jones’ journalism, and thus hitting that big number, matters tremendously right now.

But you told us fundraising is annoying—with the gimmicks, overwrought tone, manipulative language, and sheer volume of urgent URGENT URGENT!!! content we’re all bombarded with. It sure can be.

So we’re going to try making this as un-annoying as possible. In “Let the Facts Speak for Themselves” we give it our best shot, answering three questions that most any fundraising should try to speak to: Why us, why now, why does it matter?

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