I. The battle over facts

When Donald Trump fired Dr. Kristine Joy Suh, head of the Bureau of Labor Statistics, after a disappointing July jobs report, it wasn’t merely a personnel decision—it was a sharp break with precedent.

Suh’s removal upended decades of tradition in which BLS commissioners, regardless of who appointed them, were shielded from political retaliation to preserve statistical integrity. In his second term, Trump has made it clear that data isn’t merely information to be reported—it’s a narrative to be controlled. If the numbers align with his message, they’re hailed as proof of success. If they don’t, they’re dismissed as fake—or worse, subversive.

This shift signals more than a partisan impulse—it marks the erosion of institutions designed to uphold objective truth. Fo

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