Biden takes shot at Trump in jobs remarks

President Biden on Friday took a shot at former President Trump in remarks to hail the August jobs report, calling out the job growth under his predecessor and top political rival.

“America’s now in one of the strongest job-creating periods in our history, in the history of our country. It wasn’t that long ago that America was losing jobs. In fact, my predecessor was one of only two presidents in history who entered his presidency and left with fewer jobs than when he entered,” Biden said in remarks at the White House.

His remarks follow Friday’s jobs report that found the U.S. added 187,000 jobs in August and the unemployment rate rose to 3.8 percent. Economists expected the U.S. to gain 170,000 jobs and maintain the July jobless rate of 3.5 percent, but the jobs report showed the labor market plateaued last month.

“We created more jobs in two years than any president ever created in a four-year, single four-year term,” Biden said, noting the U.S. had a 6.3 percent unemployment rate when he took office at the end of Trump’s term.

“We’ve recovered all the jobs lost during the pandemic, we’ve added a million more new jobs,” he said. 

Biden bashed Trump again about overtime rules under his presidency.

The Biden administration earlier this week announced a new proposed rule to extend overtime pay for most salaried workers earning about $55,000 per year and to automatically update the salary threshold every three years.

In 2019, the Trump administration raised the salary threshold to expand overtime pay eligibility but abandoned the Obama-era rule to adjust salary limits automatically, urging the Labor Department instead to update the limits “more regularly.”

“The automatic update was something we did in the Obama-Biden administration but my predecessor scrapped it. We worked to bring it back and it will make a big difference for a lot of American families,” Biden said Friday.

The president also touted that inflation is around 3 percent, compared to more than 8 percent a year ago and now closer to pre-pandemic levels.

“I came to office determined to build the economy in a different way … to move away from trickle-down economics and instead focus on the middle class,” Biden said.

Trump and Biden are favorites for their parties’ presidential nominations in 2024, setting up a possible rematch of the 2020 election. Trump is polling double-digits ahead of other GOP rivals despite multiple legal battles across the country.