x
Breaking News
More () »

Sarah Huckabee Sanders sorry for false claim on black employment

Sarah Huckabee Sanders admitted she was wrong when she claimed President Trump has already created more jobs for African-Americans than President Obama did.
Credit: Alex Wong/Getty Images
White House Press Secretary Sarah Sanders conducts a White House daily news briefing at the James Brady Press Briefing Room of the White House June 18, 2018 in Washington, DC.

White House Press Secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders offered a rare correction and apology after providing false information during a press briefing Tuesday about how many jobs Barack Obama created for blacks during his presidency.

Sanders incorrectly told reporters President Donald Trump had created three times as many jobs for African-Americans as former President Barack Obama had during his entire eight years in the White House.

"Correction from today’s briefing: Jobs numbers for Pres Trump and Pres Obama were correct, but the time frame for Pres Obama wasn’t," Sanders posted on Twitter. "I’m sorry for the mistake, but no apologies for the 700,000 jobs for African Americans created under President Trump."

Media outlets were quick to fact-check with data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics. When Obama was president, he created nearly 3 million jobs for blacks, about 15 times what Sanders claimed.

Sanders had been attempting to show Trump's record with the African-American population was not only great, but even better than Obama's, explaining Trump tripled Obama's job creation record for the black community.

"This President since he took office, in the year and a half that he's been here, has created 700,000 new jobs for African-Americans," Sanders said Tuesday.

She continued: "That's 700,000 African-Americans that are working now that weren't working when this President took place. When President Obama left, after eight years in office, he had only created 195,000 jobs for African-Americans."

The claim was made during Sanders' defense of Trump on race after the president was accused of using the N-word on tape and called former White House aide Omarosa Manigault Newman a "dog" on Twitter.

The White House Council of Economic Advisers posted an apology on Twitter, saying there was a miscommunication to Sanders.

Before You Leave, Check This Out