When in Doubt, Attack the Numbers

The Congressional Budget Office this week concluded that 24 million Americans stand to lose their health insurance by 2026 if the Republican plan to revise Obamacare is approved. Many of the plan's supporters didn’t like what they heard, so they criticized the CBO and its numbers.

White House spokesman Sean Spicer said "If you’re looking at the CBO for accuracy, you’re looking in the wrong place."

Former Speaker of the House and Trump administration supporter Newt Gingrich said "They should abolish the Congressional Budget Office. It is corrupt. It is dishonest."

It's not the first time the Trump administration has responded to inconvenient news by attacking government statistics. When asked about the most recent jobs report last week, Spicer said the numbers "may have been phony in the past" but were "very real" this time.

This week on Money Talking, Cardiff Garcia, U.S. Editor with the Financial Time’s Alphaville blog, and Stan Collender, a federal budget expert with Qorvis MSLGROUP, take a look at what happens when officials openly dismiss numbers from independent government agencies.

The President and his supporters have been dismissing government statistics they disagree with, opening the doors for future attacks on independent agencies and their numbers.