Trump’s Treasury Secretary Thinks It’s Good That the Economy Is Bad

Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent wants you to think that a weak job market is a good thing.

CNBC’s Sara Eisen asked Bessent to comment on recent signs that the job market was cracking. Bessent downplayed the “noisy” numbers suggesting the job market was not stable.

“The jobs that we’re seeing are going to Americans,” Bessent. “After the deportations that we’ve seen during the President Trump administration and the closing of the border, that’s like this unfettered migration, we don’t need to produce as many jobs.”

In July, the U.S. labor market shed 23,000 jobs, a worrying sign when paired with high gas prices and tariff-based inflation. Notably, women accounted for 100 percent of that decline, losing 32,000 jobs while men gained 9,000. The report also revised down job growth numbers from the previous two months.

For several months, the Trump administration has been pushing Americans to lower their expectations for job growth to reflect a labor market that doesn’t rely on undocumented immigrants. Americans don’t need jobs, apparently! It’s a strange spin for the simple fact that the president’s sweeping deportations are hurting the economy.

Meanwhile, the Trump administration claims that more than 2 million immigrants have left the country since Trump reentered office—something that couldn’t possibly be true.

The Trump administration’s plan to allow oil and gas extraction near the Chaco Culture National Historical Park in New Mexico is drawing concerns from UNESCO, the United Nations’s heritage organization.

The Guardian reports that the organization is alarmed that the administration is getting rid of a buffer zone around the park, which is a world heritage site. “The world heritage committee has consistently considered extractive activities to be incompatible with world heritage status,” a UNESCO spokesperson told the paper.

The committee has also “emphasized that projects proposed outside world heritage properties should not adversely affect their outstanding universal value—which are the features of the site that justify its inscription, and should be subject to appropriate impact assessments before decisions are taken,” the spokesperson added.

The federal Bureau of Land Management has proposed getting rid of a 10-mile buffer zone protecting the area from any industrial activity, whether that’s uranium mining or fossil fuel drilling. Tribal leaders, environmental groups, and archaeologists have all warned that the site could be irreparably damaged from such activity. In a 12-day public comment period earlier this year, the government received close to 100,000 comments mostly opposed to ending the buffer zone.

“This park offers an incredible transportive experience where you essentially go back in time 1,000 years to experience what the ancient Pueblo people saw,” Maude Dinan, New Mexico program manager at the National Parks Conservation Association, told The Guardian. “The buffer zone is incredibly important and removing it would completely change this experience.”

The New Mexico park is one of 27 world heritage sites in the U.S., ranging from national parks like Yosemite and Yellowstone to landmarks like the Statue of Liberty. The lone American site on UNESCO’s list of heritage sites whose preservation is in danger is Everglades National Park in Florida, thanks to nearby development and pollution. Chaco and other sites where the administration has pushed for development, mining, and drilling, such as Big Bend National Park, could soon join that list.

Senate Democrats are initiating a probe into whether Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth placed one of his own supporters inside the independent military newspaper Stars and Stripes.

“Our offices have been informed that the Department of Defense assigned an active-duty Public Affairs officer to serve as a ‘deputy’ to Stars and Stripes Publisher Max Lederer, reportedly without consultation with Mr. Lederer,” Senators Elizabeth Warren, Richard Blumenthal, and Jeanne Shaheen wrote in a Thursday letter to Hegseth. “On August 18, Mr. Lederer announced that he will retire after more than three decades at Stars and Stripes … citing fundamental differences between his understanding of the value and mission of Stars and Stripes and the Department’s plans for the organization.”

“The placement of an active-duty Public Affairs officer in the senior leadership of an organization whose credibility depends on its independence from the military chain of command raises serious questions.”

Stars and Stripes is partly funded by the Defense Department but has long had editorial independence. Installing an active-duty military officer in an editorial position at the newspaper in the midst of an extremely unpopular overhaul of Pentagon leadership—and an even more unpopular war on Iran—reeks of bias. The senators gave Hegseth a deadline of August 28 to offer a “detailed explanation” as to why he appointed the active-duty officer to oversee the outlet.

“For generations, American service members, particularly those stationed overseas and in combat zones, have relied on Stars and Stripes for credible and independent news,” the letter concluded. “At this critical moment of leadership transition, that independence must not be compromised. We urge you to preserve that independence and provide prompt answers regarding these latest developments.”

Hegseth has already demonstrated a desire for narrative control over what both civilians and service members know about his leadership. Earlier this year, the Pentagon fired the ombudsman responsible for guaranteeing the military paper’s editorial independence. Last year, he filled the Pentagon Press Corps with sycophants from the likes of ultraconservative organizations like Turning Point USA shortly after instituting a “pledge” for Pentagon reporters, requiring them to abstain from receiving any unauthorized material or publishing without approval. And the administration at large has fought with reporters covering troops’ low morale, low provisions, and severe injuries in the war on Iran.

Hegseth has yet to officially respond.

Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent tried in vain to spin the country’s astronomical $40 trillion debt on CNBC Thursday.

Speaking to the network’s Sara Eisen, Bessent admitted that he didn’t know when the Iran war would end, but that things were otherwise going well with the economy despite the soaring national debt and increasing deficit.

“This Iran conflict, we will get on the other side of this. We don’t know when,” Bessent said, failing to inspire much confidence.

Bessent was even less inspirational when it came to the national debt, telling Eisen, “There’s nothing magic about the 40 trillion number, and we can grow our way out of that,” before blaming tariff refunds for the poor GDP and rising deficit.

“One of things that’s temporary here that’s influencing the deficit has been these tariff refunds, and we won’t have to do that again,” Bessent said, adding that the administration was reinstituting tariffs. “I would expect that our 2026 tariff income is going to be roughly what it was in 2025.”

When Eisen asked if “we have seen peak deficit during this administration,” Bessent replied, “I think there’s a very good chance we have.”

“We are going to be laser-focused, as I said. [Office of Management and Budget] Director Vought, myself, the president; that combined with the vice president’s fraud task force, where I think we could save several hundred billion dollars,” Bessent said.

Suggesting that the deficit isn’t going to increase beyond current levels doesn’t make sense with how President Trump is spending money on everything from the Iran war to his pet construction projects. There’s no guarantee that Trump’s new tariff approach will survive court challenges either. And Bessent couldn’t help but admit that the Iran war shows no sign of ending anytime soon, meaning that his positive forecast is just a lot of wishful thinking.

President Trump’s Justice Department is teaming up with Elon Musk’s xAI to fight Minnesota’s ban on AI that lets users create sexual images of people without their consent. 

The DOJ filed a statement of interest this week arguing that the law goes too far, and is broader than federal law. 

Minnesota’s ban states that “a person who owns or controls a website, application, software, program, or other service must not: (1) allow a user to access, download, or use the website, application, software, program, or other service to nudify an image or video; or (2) nudify an image or video on behalf of a user.” Breaking the law carries a fine of up to $500,000.

The law defines “nudify” as “the process by which an image or video is altered or generated to depict an intimate part not depicted in an original unaltered image or video of an identifiable individual.” It also applies when “the altered or generated image or video is so realistic that a reasonable person would believe that the intimate part belongs to the identifiable individual.” 

The DOJ argued that the law “sweeps up constitutional and productive conduct not prohibited under federal law because of the way Minnesota drafted (and apparently will enforce) the statute.”

Musk’s xAi filed its lawsuit last month on First Amendment grounds after a temporary restraining order request was denied.

xAI’s attorneys argue that the law would hold the company unfairly liable for users nudifying images. They also argue that xAI has adequate moderation tactics in place to stop it from happening in the first place. 

“The state would punish xAI for allowing a user to nudify themselves,” attorney Robert Dunn said to Courthouse News. Minnesota disagrees.

“It’s certainly not surprising that xAI is not coming into federal court and saying, ‘We support these images,’” Minnesota Assistant Attorney General Janine Kimble said to Courthouse News. “They say, ‘Look at our terms of service; we tell people not to do this.’ … And yet, they still are reporting tens of thousands of users creating images.”

In January, Musk himself admitted that his Grok AI chatbot was posting nude images of children at the behest of some of his platform’s most perverted users. He blamed  “lapses in safeguards.” The chatbot also posted nude deepfake images of adult women without their consent—making Minnesota’s law seem all the more reasonable.