*** Public sector employment ticked up slightly in the July 2 jobs report, with nationwide gains of 33,000 jobs between May and June. Between April and May, state and local government shed 571,000 jobs due to the economic repercussions of the COVID-19 pandemic. Overall government employment remains 1.5 million below that of February, before public health orders shutdown schools, government offices and other public facilities.
***The House Foreign Affairs Committee postponed a planned July 2 hearing with a top State Department official at his request. Under Secretary for Management Brian Bulatao had been scheduled to testify about President Trump's controversial decision to fire the agency's Inspector General, Steve Linick. In a statement, Chairman Eliot Engel (D-N.Y.) said he agreed to Bulatao's request that the hearing be postponed because the agency had only just received its IG report about the White House's emergency declaration to send Saudi Arabia $8 billion worth of firearms and needed time to review it. Linick had been investigating Secretary of State Mike Pompeo's role in passing the emergency declaration at the time of his firing, which the President said was because he "had lost confidence" in Linick. Engel said that the hearing would be held later in July