Donald Trump’s firing of the head of the Bureau of Labor Statistics has exposed deepening fissures within a data agency vital to measuring the strength of the world’s largest economy. The US president sacked BLS commissioner Erika McEntarfer hours after the agency on Friday published a gloomy July jobs report,

After President Donald Trump unceremoniously fired the head of the Bureau of Labor Statistics following Friday’s disappointing jobs report, criticism and condemnation have come swiftly, as economists and politicians warn that the politicization of federal statistics and the agencies that produce them erodes confidence in data that is crucial to both government and business.