President Donald Trump on Friday celebrated a new jobs report showing better-than-expected economic numbers in the month of May.
“This is outstanding what happened today,” Trump said to reporters.
The unemployment rate fell to 13.3 percent in May from a record high of 14.7 percent in April and payrolls unexpectedly rose by 2.5 million workers. Economists estimated the unemployment rate would rise to nearly 20 percent in May and that the economy would shed an additional 8 million jobs.
The president held a triumphant press conference in the Rose Garden after the news was announced Friday morning.
“This is better than a ‘V,’ this is a rocket ship,” Trump said, referring to the economic curve.
The president said that the swift bounceback was a result of the economy already being strong, thanks to his economic policies.
“Our body was so powerful that we could actually close our country, save millions of lives, stop people very early on from China coming in,” he said, and added, “That strength helped us get through this pandemic.”
The news suggested that the downward trend for economic numbers after the coronavirus was at an end and starting to rebound rigorously, even with some major cities still on lockdown.
Trump criticized the “lockdown governors” in several Democrat-run states for keeping businesses closed.
“I don’t know why they continue to lockdown, because if you look at Georgia, Florida, South Carolina, if you look at so many different places that have opened up,” he said.
The president was ecstatic, speaking quickly off the cuff in glowing terms about the country’s recovery.
He warned Americans about Democrat policies, that would likely kill the economic comeback.
“The only thing that can stop us is bad policy, left-wing bad policy of raising taxes,” he said, warning that the proposed “Green New Deal” from Democrats would be a “disaster.”