In latest appearances, President Trump has been dismissive of considerations over the Black unemployment fee, even suggesting at one level that there had been “big drops” in unemployment for these staff.
“African American unemployment is now doing higher than it’s ever performed,” he mentioned during an event in June. “And I don’t know the place that stat got here from, however I’ll take it.”
In fact, Black unemployment isn’t even as little as it was throughout Trump’s first time period. The unemployment fee crossed 8% last fall and is at the moment hovering round 6.6%. Throughout racial teams, Black staff have nearly all the time skilled the next incidence of unemployment, with few exceptions (the pandemic being one).
As The Metropolis Reporter noted this week, Black unemployment is very extreme in a few of the most various cities within the nation—particularly, New York Metropolis.
In line with the report, which pulls on knowledge from the New York state comptroller, the unemployment fee for Black staff is at the moment about 8.8%, the best of any metropolis within the U.S. Nevertheless it’s not simply these workers whose standing has slipped within the labor market. The state knowledge additionally indicated that solely white staff noticed their employment enhance over the past yr.
Another data set from the New York Metropolis Financial Improvement Corp. confirmed that whereas Black staff had been dealing with the best influence, different racial teams had additionally seen an increase in unemployment: As of the primary quarter of 2026, the unemployment fee was over 7% for each Hispanic and BIPOC (Black, Indigenous, and folks of coloration) staff.
It’s commonplace for the unemployment fee to be considerably greater for Black staff than it’s for white staff. Nevertheless it’s notable that the hole in unemployment has widened to five.6 share factors, as of the third quarter final yr. And in keeping with The Metropolis Reporter, this isn’t simply occurring in probably the most populous metropolis within the nation.
The hole between Black and white unemployment has additionally elevated in Los Angeles, albeit to a lesser diploma (although Black unemployment there was notably excessive in 2025 at 9.6%). In Chicago, the hole was smaller, although it persevered; in the meantime, cities like Atlanta and Dallas had comparatively low Black unemployment regardless of seeing an uptick in Black residents lately.
It’s no coincidence that this shift has taken place in opposition to the backdrop of sustained assaults on range, fairness, and inclusion efforts in each the federal authorities and company America, which have taken a toll on Black employment since final yr. Trump’s government orders explicitly targeted DEI applications and workers within the public sector, however the sweeping federal layoffs in 2025 additionally disproportionately impacted Black staff, who’re overrepresented in these jobs. Whereas Black ladies had been extra acutely affected by these losses final yr, it now appears that labor market participation for Black males is dropping extra rapidly.
In New York Metropolis, which has the biggest Black inhabitants of any metropolis, these forces might have been notably damaging. As The Metropolis Reporter notes, a few of the blue-collar sectors that had propped up Black employment in New York Metropolis have been on the decline, from manufacturing and building to meals service. Unemployment amongst younger Black staff has additionally remained distinctly greater than the general youth unemployment fee, which truly dropped 1.3 share factors in 2025.
As Valerie Wilson—the director of this system on race, ethnicity, and the economic system on the Financial Coverage Institute—told Fast Company final December, the labor market remains to be rebounding from the fallout of the Trump administration’s anti-DEI insurance policies.
The truth that unemployment stays excessive for Black staff means that they’ve struggled to recuperate from the job losses in 2025, pointing to a slower restoration than there might need been if DEI applications had been as strong and effectively considered they as soon as had been.
