Was Bureau of Labor Statistics Commissioner Erika McEntarfer arrested by "U.S. Navy JAG" on "treason charges" related to the weak July 2025 job report published by the agency? No, that's not true: As of this writing, McEntarfer was fired by the Trump administration, but no credible source has published any reports about the purported arrest. The rumor came from a website with an extensive collection of fabricated news reports featuring fictional arrests of high-ranking officials by the members of the military, arrests that would violate The Posse Comitatus Act.
The claim appeared in a post (archived here) published on X on August 5, 2025, under the title:
JAG ARRESTS BIDEN OPERATIVE FOR TREASON AFTER ECONOMIC FRAUD EXPOSED.
The post continued:
Sources say Erika McEntarfer -- former Bureau of Labor Statistics Commissioner and Biden loyalist -- has been arrested by U.S. Navy JAG on treason charges after allegedly falsifying July's job numbers to tank the Trump economy.
This is what the entry looked like on X at the time of writing:
(Image source: screenshot of a post by the 17QStorm account on X.com)
Bureau of Labor Statistics Commissioner Erika McEntarfer (archived here) was fired by Trump (archived here) on August 1, 2025, following a weaker-than-expected July hiring report (archived here) showing the addition of only 73,000 jobs in July 2025.
There were, however, no reports from credible news organizations that she was then arrested on treason charges: searches across news articles on Google (archived here) and Yahoo (archived here) showed no results.
The claim reviewed in this fact check originated (archived here) from Real Raw News. It is a website that has a history of publishing false claims in mock news stories, many of them about convictions and executions of various public figures at Naval Station Guantanamo Bay in Cuba. For example, the site reported former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton was hanged (she wasn't); former White House Chief of Staff John Podesta was executed (he wasn't); and "the military" convicted former Attorney General William Barr on charges of treason (it didn't).
"U.S. Navy JAG" stands for the Navy Judge Advocate General's Corps (archived here). Its website doesn't list domestic law enforcement against civilians as an area of its practice (archived here). The 1878 Posse Comitatus Act (archived here) bans (archived here) the use of the Army, including the Navy, from conducting law enforcement operations against the general public not affiliated with the military unless there is an explicit authorization by the Constitution or Congress.
Treason (archived here) is a federal crime that would be investigated by a federal-level agency such as the FBI and not by the Navy, which only has jurisdiction over military personnel.
The website for Real Raw News includes a disclaimer that declares the site does not stand by the contents of the stories, calling them entertainment. Specifically, it says (archived here):
Information on this website is for informational and educational and entertainment purposes. ... We have included this disclaimer for our protection, on the advice on legal counsel.
(Image source: Screenshot taken by Lead Stories of the About section of RealRawNews.com)
