It’s only the third day of a much-feared month of September and sobering US economic news is already piling up. Yesterday it was six straight months of shrinking manufacturing. Today it’s job openings falling in July to the lowest in 10 months, adding to other employment data (including a report last month that caused Donald Trump to fire the head of the Bureau of Labor Statistics) showing America’s once-robust post-pandemic jobs landscape continues to darken.

Even worse, the sectors most responsible for the new numbers aren’t cyclical and had been recent drivers of growth. Available positions decreased to 7.18 million from a downwardly revised 7.36 million in June, according to data published Wednesday by the BLS, a division of the US Department of Labor. The median estimate in a Bloomberg survey of economists called for 7.38 million openings.

The pullback in openings was driven by health care, retail trade and leisure and hospitality. Vacancies in health care, which has been a major source of new jobs this year, dropped to the lowest level since 2021.

And that’s not the end of it. Also on Wednesday, the Federal Reserve’s Beige Book reported “flat to declining consumer spending because, for many households, wages were failing to keep up with rising prices.” The Fed also stated that “nearly all districts noted tariff-related price increases” with many saying “tariffs were especially impactful on the prices of inputs.” Still, all this dour data is good news for Wall Street, inasmuch as it pushes a rate cut closer to a fait accompli. —David E. Rovella

What You Need to Know Today

Harvard University scored a major legal victory in its battle with the Trump administration after a federal court ruled Trump illegally froze more than $2 billion in research funding. Trump violated Harvard’s free speech rights and didn’t follow proper procedures when he suspended a wide range of research grants in April, a judge ruled. 

The decision came less than a day after a federal appeals court held the Trump Administration illegally deported men and boys it claimed without any public evidence were Venezuelan gang members under a two-century old wartime law. (A Bloomberg investigation showed 90% of them to have no US criminal records). The use of the Alien Enemies Act of 1798 to deport the immigrants was ruled unlawful because their presence in the US didn’t amount to an “invasion” or “predatory incursion” by a foreign nation as required under the plain language of the 227-year-old statute. 

The Supreme Court ruled earlier this year that Venezuelans facing deportation under the act must receive notice that they face removal in a “reasonable time and in such a manner” to bring a legal challenge. Several federal judges have ruled that Trump improperly invoked the law, but the high court—whose Republican-appointed supermajority has repeatedly ruled in favor of Trump’s unprecedented expansion of presidential power—has yet to answer the question.

Several West Coast states are forming a health alliance to coordinate immunization recommendations given the upheaval at US health agencies under Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy, Jr.

The West Coast Health Alliance of California, Oregon and Washington will “help safeguard scientific expertise by ensuring that public health policies” in the three states “are informed by trusted scientists, clinicians and other public health leaders,” the office of California Governor Gavin Newsom said.

Kennedy has fired top medical experts who advised the agency, replacing them in some cases with fellow vaccine skeptics. The Trump administration has also sought to limit access to Covid vaccines amid a summer infection wave. State health officials in the Northeast have been meeting to discuss potentially coordinating their vaccine guidance as well. Florida, meanwhile, is going in a different direction.

Massachusetts Governor Maura Healey urged Trump to stop the government’s push to halt offshore wind developments, saying more electricity supplies are needed to help consumers struggling to pay already-high utility bills.

The federal government should be “working with states, not against states, in an effort to bring more power on board,” Healey said Wednesday in an interview with Bloomberg News in Boston. “That’s what I really urge the Trump administration to get back to. It makes no sense.”

Maura Healey, governor of Massachusetts, during an interview in Boston on Wednesday.  Photographer: Sophie Park/Bloomberg

Republicans are planning to change Senate rules to confirm Trump’s nominees in one vote, using their three-vote majority to speed up his ability to fill top regulatory, judicial and other posts while essentially neutering Democratic dissent. The move would mark the latest erosion of the power of the Senate minority, which has traditionally used the chamber’s long-standing procedures to serve as a check on the party in power.

It comes on the heels of GOP moves this summer to retroactively approve Trump’s actions to cancel spending approved by Congress, creating an end-run around the bipartisan spending process and the Constitution’s grant of spending power solely to the legislature. The new rule change presents a risk for Republicans, however, should the Democratic Party ever regain control of both the Senate and the White House.

What You’ll Need to Know Tomorrow