President Donald Trump touted a positive economic report amid warnings of another potential government shutdown Friday.
"The most amazing thing is government jobs are way down and yet the employment numbers are very good," Trump said at a meeting of oil company executives and his cabinet that aired on Newsmax.
"We have gotten rid of tremendous numbers of federal job[s], government jobs," Trump added. "No one has ever seen anything like it. And yet the unemployment numbers are really good."
Trump also touted the Atlanta Fed’s GDPNow estimate that U.S. real GDP growth was running at an annualized 5.4% rate for the fourth quarter of 2025, crediting his tariffs and his election with the improved economic outlook.
"Nobody thought that," Trump said. "They thought it would be 2%."
"Our country was dead one and a half years ago and now we have the hottest country anywhere in the world and I hope you are impressed," Trump added.
"There’s no reason it can’t be much, much higher than that," Trump continued.
The president noted the positive economic numbers came despite a 43-day government shutdown, the longest government shutdown in history.
The government is once again set to shut down if Congress does not pass funding legislation by Friday, Jan. 30.
"You may have another shutdown," Trump said. "We’ll see what happens."
Sam Barron ✉
Sam Barron has almost two decades of experience covering a wide range of topics including politics, crime and business.
© 2026 Newsmax. All rights reserved.