Jay Inslee is trying to kick his fundraising machine into high gear in advance of a dinner President Barack Obama agreed to in Seattle on June 24th. A recent email pushing tickets to the dinner stated the following:
“Under President Obama’s leadership, our nation’s progress has been staggering. We’ve turned our economy around … President Obama’s remarkable record of accomplishments will not soon be forgotten.”
Unfortunately for Inslee’s sales pitch, he sent out the email to supporters on Friday, June 3 — the same day the Obama administration released its dismal jobs report for May employment. The Wall Street Journal:
“President Obama’s election-year campaign to make Americans feel great about the economy again was rudely interrupted Friday by the reality of the job market. The economy created a dismal 38,000 net new jobs in May, the worst monthly performance since 2010…
“The unemployment rate has been falling—it fell again in May to 4.7%—but maybe that’s because millions of people have left the job market in frustration.
“The jobless rate declined largely because the labor force fell by some 458,000 in May. As for those still in the labor force, the number working part-time who would prefer to have full-time work but can’t find it increased by 468,000.
“All of this reduced the labor participation rate back down to 62.6%, compared to 63% two months ago. This is the soft underbelly of the labor market and helps explain why so many Americans aren’t buying the line that this expansion is fabulous.”
Yet, on the same day as the release of such a disastrous jobs report, Inslee pushes an alternate reality in which Obama “turned our economy around.”
In a bizarre choice of words, Inslee claims progress has been “staggering.” We agree — the economy is staggering indeed, but that’s not a reason to support Inslee… or Obama.
