Kevin Hassett, director of the National Economic Council, is interviewed, after the Labor Department's Bureau of Labor Statistics released an employment report for August, outside the White House in Washington, D.C., U.S., September 5, 2025. REUTERS/Brian Snyder
Kevin Hassett, director of the National Economic Council, is interviewed, after the Labor Department's Bureau of Labor Statistics released an employment report for August, outside the White House in Washington, D.C., U.S., September 5, 2025. REUTERS/Brian Snyder
Kevin Hassett, director of the National Economic Council, is interviewed, after the Labor Department's Bureau of Labor Statistics released an employment report for August, outside the White House in Washington, D.C., U.S., September 5, 2025. REUTERS/Brian Snyder
FILE PHOTO: Light shines on the White House in Washington, U.S., March 29, 2020. REUTERS/Al Drago/File photo

By Susan Heavey

WASHINGTON (Reuters) -The White House said it expects the Federal Reserve to weigh larger rate cuts this month after Friday's "disappointing" jobs report, while President Donald Trump and his administration said it could be a year before the U.S. sees rosier economic data.

"The main market expectation is 25 basis points. But I would guess that there would be an expectation, a discussion of a higher cut, but I wouldn't expect it to happen," White House National Economic Council Director Kevin Hassett told reporters at the White House after the Labor Department report showed weaker job growth in August and the unemployment rate rising to 4.3%.

Trump for months has been pushing the U.S. central bank to lower its benchmark rates, saying the cuts are needed to bolster his economic policies and fuel growth even as some critics have raised questions about threats to the Fed's independence.

"Jerome 'Too Late' Powell should have lowered rates long ago. As usual, he’s 'Too Late!'" Trump posted on social media following the jobs data.

Friday's dim jobs data has raised some alarm bells and is seen likely to push Fed policymakers to seek to shore up the softening job market with at least a 25-basis-point rate cut when they meet September 16-17.

"It's a little bit of a disappointing job number, but I pretty much expect it's going to revise up," Hassett told CNBC in a separate interview, citing the housing sector in particular.

TARIFFS GENERATE VOLATILITY, UNCERTAINTY

Trump swept back into office in January on a campaign promising prosperity and has moved quickly to unleash his economic policies, including widespread tariffs.

That larger trade war has fueled increased volatility in financial markets and economic uncertainty. Big U.S. banks last month also warned of potential weakness ahead, even as they said consumer finances were healthy.

Questions have also been raised about the credibility of U.S. economic data after Trump fired the head of the Labor Department's Bureau of Labor Statistics when the previous jobs report showed weaker-than-expected employment growth in July.

Hassett, in predicting the August data would be revised, cast some blame on how BLS conducts job surveys, telling reporters: "That's one reason why President Trump thinks we need a new set of eyes over there at BLS to fix this problem."

Asked about the accuracy of the jobs numbers in the wake of the firing, U.S. Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick said he expected the data to improve as more people are removed from the statistics agency.

"I think they'll get better because he'll take out the people who are just trying to create noise against the president," Lutnick told CNBC, saying people would see "the greatest growth economy ... starting six months from today to a year from today."

Trump, asked on Thursday about the report ahead of its release, said Americans could expect to see "the real numbers" in about a year, without offering any other detail.

“The real numbers that I'm talking about are going to be whatever it is, but will be in a year from now on," Trump told reporters, according to a pool report. "You're gonna see job numbers like our country has never seen."

Hassett on Friday pointed to other pillars of the economy that he said were strong, including capital spending on new factories and other projects, a 3% GDP rate, low inflation, and "solid" economic growth.

"The only part of the data that's disappointing is that the jobs numbers have been a little bit lower over the last three or four months," he said at the White House. "President Trump knows that we're super optimistic about the future of the jobs numbers."

(Reporting by Susan Heavey; Additional reporting by Katharine Jackson; Editing by Chizu Nomiyama, Andrea Ricci, Rod Nickel)