Summers on BLS commissioner firing: 'Way beyond anything that Richard Nixon ever did'

Former U.S. Treasury Secretary Larry Summers on Sunday said President Trump's decision to fire the commissioner of the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) following a dismal jobs report is "way beyond anything that Richard Nixon ever did."

During an appearance on ABC News's "This Week," Summers slammed the decision to fire Erika McEntarfer and said it was worse than the firings made by former President Nixon, who notably fired the special prosecutor investigating the Watergate scandal, with others submitting their resignations alongside him. While Nixon was not impeached, he eventually resigned over the scandal. 

"This is way beyond anything that Richard Nixon ever did," he said. "I'm surprised that other officials have not responded by resigning themselves as took place when Richard Nixon fired people lawlessly."

Summers called it a "preposterous charge," noting that the numbers were compiled "by teams of literally hundreds of people following detailed procedures that are in manuals."

"There's no conceivable way that the head of the BLS could have manipulated this number," he added. "The numbers are in line with what we’re seeing from all kinds of private sector sources."

He said the move "is the stuff of democracies giving way to authoritarianism," comparing it to "threatening the heads of newspapers," "launching assaults on universities," and "launching assaults on law firms that defend clients that the elected boss finds uncongenial."

"This is really scary stuff," he continued. "And it can hardly be surprising that when the rule of law is a bit in question, that there's a big uncertainty premium in the markets that is operating to both make there be less investment, which slows the economy down, and also means there's less supply so that there's more inflationary pressure."

Trump's firing of the BLS commissioner comes after a weaker-than-expected jobs report that showed the economy gained only 73,000 jobs in July, far worse than previously reported in May and June.

Summers noted that Trump is "looking to set up a scapegoat if the economy performs badly" when asked about the president's heavy criticism of Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell, who Trump said he "most likely" won't oust.

In May 2020, Trump said he  “learned a lot from Richard Nixon" and not to "fire people."

“I learned a lot from Richard Nixon. Don’t fire people,” Trump said during a phone interview with “Fox & Friends" at the time.

“I learned a lot. I study history,” he said. “And the firing of everybody — I should’ve in one way, but I’m glad I didn’t, because look at the way it turned out. They’re all a bunch of crooks and they got caught.” 

Still, Trump's latest firing has seen pushback from lawmakers and experts in the field, including statisticians.