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“Another fake jobs report out from Biden-Harris government today,” the Florida Republican wrote on social media. “16 of the last 17 reports have been significantly revised downwards after media helps them with their fake headlines.”

“But all the fake numbers in the world aren’t going to fool people dealing with the Biden-Harris economic disaster every day,” he declared.

During Donald Trump’s 2016 presidential campaign, the Republican faced a dilemma. On the one hand, the economy was relatively healthy at the time, and the unemployment rate was steadily improving in the run-up to Election Day. On the other hand, Trump wanted voters to believe the United States was in the midst of an economic disaster that only he could fix.

The GOP nominee settled on a specific rhetorical strategy to resolve the tension: Trump would simply peddle nonsense and tell the public to believe him, instead of reality. As we discussed at the time, at different points during the campaign, the Republican publicly argued, for example, that the unemployment rate was 20% — or possibly 42% — even as reality pointed to a rate below 5%.

After the election, at a pre-inaugural press conference, Trump declared there are “96 million really wanting a job and they can’t get,” which was ridiculous, even for him. Around the same time, the then-president-elect declared that the unemployment rate was “totally fiction.”

Eight years later, as job growth under another Democratic president soars, the Republican is turning to a familiar message. “The Biden job numbers are fake,” the presumptive GOP nominee told a Wisconsin audience yesterday.