White House cuts delay before government comments on economic data

By David Shepardson

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – The White House said on Wednesday it was cutting in half the delay before executive branch officials can comment on leading economic data releases to 30 minutes.

A 1985 directive has required the White House to wait an hour before commenting on employment numbers and data on gross domestic product, inflation, international trade, personal income, and other metrics.

The White House Office of Management and Budget (OMB) said the change that takes effect Feb. 19 retains “a necessary time delay between policy-neutral release of the official statistics and subsequent Executive Branch interpretations of this statistical data.

OMB proposed the change in August, saying since 1985 “there have been many changes in the way we communicate within and across society, as well as in how the relevant agencies disseminate information.”

In 2019 under then-President Donald Trump, OMB had considered doing away with the delay entirely but received opposition and did not change the policy.

In June 2018, Trump broke with prior practices with a tweet that suggested a positive jobs report would be released by the Labor Department later that morning.

Trump’s tweet saying he was “looking forward” to the jobs report more than an hour before its release gave financial markets a positive jolt ahead of the release showing 223,000 jobs created in May 2018 with the unemployment rate falling to 3.8%.

Under long-standing tradition, the president and U.S. Treasury secretary are briefed on the employment data the night before their release, typically on the first Friday every month.

The 30-minute delay for Executive Branch comment applies to numerous releases everything from jobs to GDP and home sales to crop production. The OMB said on Wednesday the 30-minute delay applies to the actual time of release — in the event releases are delayed.

(Reporting by David Shepardson; editing by Jonathan Oatis)