Following a report that showed a spike in layoff announcements, a Fox Business reporter said it could be “good news” for President Donald Trump.
The consulting firm Challenger, Gray & Christmas released a report on Thursday, revealing that companies have announced 1.17 million layoffs in 2025, the most in a single year since the height of the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020. For about 8,000 of those layoffs, Trump’s tariffs have been cited as the reason for job cuts.
Despite the dire economic sign—one of many in recent days—Fox Business reporter Grady Trimble saw an upside for Trump while discussing the new report with pro-Trump anchor Stuart Varney.
“This signifies the cooling job market that we’ve seen for some time now, Stu, but it could be good news for the president in the end because he wants the Fed to cut rates and this jobs data increases the chances of that happening next week,” Trimble said.
The Fox News spin (Fox Business is owned by Fox News) comes as a series of economic indicators show weakness under Trump after years of improvement under former President Joe Biden.
On Wednesday, payroll processor ADP’s November report showed a total 32,000 drop in private-sector jobs for the month, with 120,000 jobs lost for small businesses. Two days before that, the Institute for Supply Management said the manufacturing industry has lost jobs for nine consecutive months this year.
In response to the bad economic news and ongoing concerns about affordability, Trump falsely said on Tuesday that the entire issue was a “fake narrative,” “scam,” and “con job by the Democrats.”
Fox’s overly optimistic reporting is in line with the network’s attempt to prop up the sagging Trump presidency.
For instance, after Trump failed to do much of what he said he would do in the first 100 days of his presidency, Fox ran a list of supposed accomplishments. Among them were nonsensical issues like ending federal support for paper straws, eliminating production of the penny, and establishing a “White House Faith Office.” Those topics were a far cry from lowering grocery prices and ending the Russia-Ukraine war, which Trump had said he would do.
Fox has spent the first year of Trump’s return to office inventing a cringe-inducing parade of excuses and justifications for his failures and shortcomings. In that context, a surge in layoffs can easily count as “good news.”
