President Donald Trump plans to announce replacements for two key government positions within the next several days: one vacancy on the Federal Reserve Board and another to lead the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS).
Both openings arose last Friday—Governor Adriana Kugler unexpectedly resigned from the Fed, while Trump fired Erika McEntarfer, the BLS commissioner.
Speaking to reporters Sunday, Trump said he has “a couple of people in mind” for the Fed vacancy and expects to name a replacement for McEntarfer soon.
“I’ll be announcing that probably over the next couple of days,” Trump said regarding the Fed spot.
Kugler’s Fed term was scheduled to expire in January, but she opted to step down early, effective August 8, without providing a reason in her resignation letter to the president.
As a Fed governor, Kugler held a permanent voting seat on the Federal Open Market Committee (FOMC), which sets the central bank’s key funds rate—a critical benchmark influencing interest rates across the U.S. economy. Governors also play a key role in shaping banking regulations.
During her tenure of less than two years, Kugler generally aligned with Fed Chair Jerome Powell’s policies, despite frequent Trump criticism of Powell.
Trump has stated he will vet future Fed nominees based on whether they support lowering interest rates.
Krishna Guha, head of global policy and central bank strategy at Evercore ISI, noted in a recent report, “The Kugler resignation jump-starts the Trumpification of the Fed by handing President Trump a vacancy into which he can place a potential or even a clearly designated successor to Powell as Fed chair.”
Possible candidates include former Fed Governor Kevin Warsh, Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent, and National Economic Council Director Kevin Hassett.
Trump dismissed McEntarfer following Friday’s disappointing jobs report, which showed the U.S. economy added just 73,000 jobs in July and included downward revisions totaling 258,000 jobs for May and June.
On his Truth Social platform Sunday, Trump accused McEntarfer of “the biggest miscalculations in over 50 years.”
While revisions are common as the BLS gathers more data for its monthly nonfarm payroll estimates, the trend of increasing revisions—exacerbated by declining survey response rates—has raised concerns. Last year, the BLS revised the 12-month payroll count prior to March 2024 downward by 818,000.
Hassett said Monday on CNBC, “I think it’s really important now that we get a fresh set of eyes over there to try to modernize the labor data, because it has to be transparent, it has to be reliable. It has to be something that market can make big bets on.”
However, McEntarfer’s firing has drawn broad criticism amid fears the move could politicize BLS data, which is crucial for economic policy and market decisions.
Michael Feroli, chief U.S. economist at JPMorgan Chase, warned, “Potential politicization of the Fed has been much discussed over the past several months, but the risk of politicizing the data collection process should not be overlooked. To borrow from the soft-landing analogy, having a flawed instrument panel can be just as dangerous as having an obediently partisan pilot.”
Trump has not publicly disclosed who might replace McEntarfer. Currently, Deputy Commissioner William Wiatrowski is serving as acting head.
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