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(NEW YORK) — After several of its brightest stars declared support for former President Donald Trump last month, Silicon Valley has now come out in force for Vice President Kamala Harris.

Though Silicon Valley remains a stronghold of support for Democrats, the Biden’s administration’s hawkish approach to tech has alienated many in the industry, and in recent months a number of high-profile entrepreneurs and investors including Elon Musk have backed Trump. But Harris, a Bay Area native with ties to the industry, could forge a stronger relationship with the Valley and has already received pledges of support from a new group called VCs for Harris — representing hundreds of prominent venture capitalists.

Leslie Feinzaig, the venture capitalist who started VCs for Harris, said she recently wrote a pledge and bought a URL to host its site without expecting much.

Within days, billionaire entrepreneur and television personality Mark Cuban and LinkedIn co-founder Reid Hoffman joined the group.

“I basically haven’t slept since,” Feinzaig said.

Feinzaig’s efforts have resulted in more than 700 pledges of support for Harris, and could signal a friendlier relationship between the vice president and the Valley than Biden has had.

“Silicon Valley had no friends in Washington during the Biden administration,” said Georgetown Law Center professor and technology regulation expert Anupam Chander. “You have the Department of Justice, which has filed those antitrust lawsuits. You have the White House and the U.S. Trade Representative, who have been retreating from efforts to ensure free flow of data across the world.”

And, of course, Chander said, you have Federal Trade Commission Chair Lina Khan, who has gained an army of fans — and detractors — for leading an ambitious effort to regulate giants such as Amazon and Meta.

The Biden administration did, however, work to pass the CHIPS Act, which allocated billions to onshore the production of semiconductors used in many electronics — an achievement celebrated by the leading tech industry advocacy group as “a major victory.”

Still, leading venture capitalists Marc Andreessen and Ben Horowitz, the co-founders of investment fund Andreessen Horowitz, cited concerns about Biden’s policies in a podcast episode announcing their support for Trump.

“The future of our business, the future of technology, new technology and the future of America is literally at stake,” Horowitz said.

Despite continuing frustrations with the Biden administration, according to industry insiders, Democrats appear to retain the support of most in Silicon Valley.

“Many of us are frustrated with Biden administration’s sort of anti-technology, anti-business stance,” said Silicon Valley investor and entrepreneur Merci Grace.

Grace said voting against Trump would be “pretty easy” for her and most of her peers, 70 or 80 percent of whom she estimates will ultimately support Harris.

Feinzaig said some of the high-profile figures in the industry who have come out in support of Trump “weren’t speaking for the full industry.”

Still, Trump has made inroads in certain corners of Silicon Valley. In June, a fundraiser hosted by tech billionaire David Sacks in coordination with Republican vice presidential nominee JD Vance — a former venture capitalist with ties to another prominent conservative tech mogul, Peter Thiel — raised $12 million for the former president’s campaign.

Trump has also received endorsements from a number of prominent entrepreneurs in the cryptocurrency sector, promising in his 2024 platform to “end Democrats’ unlawful and unAmerican Crypto crackdown.” Also, he spoke at the annual Bitcoin Conference in late July.

The former president has taken a stern stance on big tech companies, calling them “too big” and “too powerful” in a July interview with Bloomberg, but saying “I don’t want to destroy them.”

Some expect Harris, meanwhile, to assuage concerns in the Valley by taking a more dovish approach than the Biden administration, though they say her policy views on tech remain an open question.

“I would expect to return to a more technocratic stance,” said Rob Merges, a law professor at U.C. Berkeley who spent several decades working in the tech industry. “A traditional Clinton, Obama — you know, friendly to the benefits of technology, reasonable in regulation, and cautious to not go too far in any one direction.”

Chander said he thinks Harris is “someone who recognizes the importance of innovation, but also worries about some of the harms that might follow.”

But, he noted, “because Harris didn’t go through a regular primary, we haven’t seen her stake out positions on some issues.”

Since Biden announced he would not seek reelection on July 21, Harris has not mentioned the tech industry in public campaign remarks and her campaign declined to comment on whether she would keep Khan at the head of the FTC (high-profile donors including Hoffman have recently urged her to do the reverse).

But the Valley needs no introduction to the vice president.

Harris dealt with the tech industry as California’s attorney general and has headed some of the Biden administration’s efforts surrounding artificial intelligence, working with top AI companies to agree on voluntary guidelines for the responsible use of generative AI. The vice president’s brother-in-law, Tony West, also serves as chief legal officer for Uber, headquartered in San Francisco. In remarks about AI in November, she said she and Biden “reject the false choice that suggests we can either protect the public or advance innovation.”

Grace said she gets the sense that Harris is “a reasonable person who is very intelligent, and we can have a discussion with her.” She added that Trump “is just someone who you can’t trust.”

“It’s not worth the temporary alignment to make a little bit more money on top of the billions that you already have — to get in bed with someone who you can’t trust,” Grace said.

Feinzaig also shared her trust in Harris.

“I feel like we have a candidate that is listening,” Feinzaig said.

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(NEW YORK) — Stock prices worldwide seesawed dramatically this week, forcing investors to keep up with sudden turns in the market and weather fears of an economic slowdown.

The S&P 500 on Monday suffered its worst decline in a single trading day since 2022. In early trading on Tuesday, the index recovered more than half of those losses.

Japan’s main Nikkei 225 stock index on Monday dropped more than 12%, its worst trading session since 1987. On Tuesday, the index soared 10%.

Market analysts who spoke to ABC News urged investors to be patient despite pressure to either join a selloff or buy a downturn. The market typically experiences temporary periods of decline, they added, noting the strong performance for stocks this year prior to the recent losses.

Broad losses may offer investors an opportunity to buy low on a high-quality stock that they’d been eyeing anyway, some analysts said, but they advised seeking out stocks viewed as long-term investments.

“I wouldn’t be panicking in this environment,” Ed Yardeni, the president of market advisory firm Yardeni Research and former chief investment strategist at Deutsche Bank’s U.S. equities division, told ABC News. “It could be a roller-coaster ride.”

Recession fears and the unwinding of a ‘carry trade’ in Japan

The stock market downswing was set off by a disappointing jobs report on Friday. Employers hired 114,000 workers in July, falling well short of economist expectations of 185,000 jobs. The unemployment rate climbed to 4.3%, the highest level since October 2021.

The lackluster jobs data fueled concern about a potential recession and calls for an interest rate cut.

The heightened worry about an economic cooldown coincided with interest rate hikes imposed by Japan’s central bank. Those rising rates prompted an unwinding of a so-called “carry trade” in which investors borrowed Japanese yen at low interest rates and used it to purchase assets, including U.S. stocks.

When Japan hiked rates, investors sold off some of those assets and sent stock prices falling.

“There are a lot of things that have happened here in the past three business days. There are a lot of headlines flying around,” Bret Kenwell, an investing analyst at eToro, told ABC News. “It’s important for investors to remember the long-term trends in the market. They should have a lot of caution.”

Between 1980 and 2023, the S&P 500 posted a positive return over the calendar year 82% of the time, Wells Fargo Investment Institute told clients in a note on Tuesday. The market experienced a drop-off of at least 10% in nearly half of those years, Wells Fargo said, adding, “The data shows that a market downturn does not necessarily mean markets will perform poorly for the year.”

Market analysts advised caution as investors weigh opportunities to take advantage of the volatility. Still, they added, some traders may find a chance to obtain stocks that were previously too expensive.

Dan Ives, a managing director of equity research at investment firm Wedbush, said the tumult roiling markets offers investors an entryway into major tech stocks at discounted prices.

“​​It’s a white-knuckle moment that we view more as an opportunity to own big tech and the AI revolution, which is not going away,” Ives told ABC News.

Nvidia, a chipmaker that had helped catapult market gains so far this year, dropped as much as 14% on Monday before recovering some of those losses. The stock climbed nearly 5% in early trading on Tuesday.

Shares of Apple fell as much as 10% on Monday, in part because Berkshire Hathaway CEO Warren Buffett sold half of his holdings in the company. Apple recovered some of those losses by the close of markets but inched downward in early trading on Tuesday.

“Any global jitters and fears of market turmoil are going to be an overhang for tech stocks,” Ives said. “We stay calm and focused on the tech winners.”

Kenwell said investors should calmly evaluate their asset allocation, risk tolerance and long-term goals.

“When volatility is spiking and markets are selling off, it’s really easy to open your portfolio and panic,” Kenwell said.

“Follow your long-term plan,” he added. “That’s why it’s there.”

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(WASHINGTON) — Google violated U.S. antitrust laws in maintaining a monopoly over the online search business, a federal judge ruled Monday, in a landmark ruling for the Justice Department in its efforts to rein in big tech giants.

D.C. District judge Amit Mehta declared Google violated Section 2 of the Sherman Act, finding the company illegally secured its dominance in the search market by paying billions of dollars to smartphone carriers like Apple to make Google the automatic search engine for their phones — effectively locking any rival businesses from being able to compete.

“Google is a monopolist, and it has acted as one to maintain its monopoly,” Mehta wrote in his ruling.

This is a developing story. Please check back for updates.

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(NEW YORK) — A worldwide selloff jolted markets on Monday in the aftermath of a weaker-than-expected U.S. jobs report that elicited fear of an economic recession.

Japan’s main Nikkei 225 stock index dropped more than 12%, its worst day of trading since 1987. Each of the major U.S. stock indexes plummeted more than 2%.

Nvidia, a chipmaker that had helped catapult market gains so far this year, dropped as much as 14% before recovering some of those losses.

Renewed warnings of an imminent recession arrive after years of doomsday forecasts that stretch back to the staggering rise of inflation three years ago. So far, the U.S. has defied alarm and sustained solid growth, proving many analysts wrong.

Economists who spoke to ABC News disagreed about whether current economic conditions warrant serious concern about a possible recession or foretell resilience of the kind that has followed previous bouts of uncertainty.

Some analysts voiced optimism, pointing to continued economic growth and a tendency for markets to overreact in the face of negative news. Others cautioned of a monthslong labor market cooldown that indicates wider economic weakness and a potential downturn.

“You can see the probability of a recession moving slightly higher, but for me it’s nowhere near the level at which you jump out of the window because the house is burning,” Olu Sonola, the head of U.S. regional economics at Fitch Ratings, told ABC News. “You can still safely take the elevator or the stairs.”

The stock market downswing was set off by a disappointing jobs report on Friday. Employers hired 114,000 workers in July, falling well short of economist expectations of 185,000 jobs. The unemployment rate climbed to 4.3%, the highest level since October 2021.

The unemployment rate has soared this year from 3.7% to 4.3%. That trend has triggered a recession indicator known as the “Sahm Rule,” which says that a rise of 0.5 percentage points in the unemployment rate within a 12-month period typically precedes a recession.

Some economists have doubted whether the trend signals a recession in this case. That’s because the rising unemployment rate owes more to an increase in eligible workers that has expanded the labor pool rather than layoffs that have reduced the number of people with jobs.

The labor market is still growing and the unemployment rate remains at a historically low level.

“I still think we’re in the soft-landing stage,” Stephan Weiler, a professor of economics at Colorado State University and a former Fed research officer, told ABC News, predicting an outcome in which inflation returns to normal and the economy averts a recession.

“Some people expected this recession two years ago or more, and it still hasn’t come about,” Weiler added.

Some economists rebutted that rosy outlook, however. Nancy Lazar, chief global economist at investment firm Piper Sandler, said the uptick in the unemployment rate marks a key piece of evidence indicating a recession will take place before the end of the year.

“It wasn’t just a one-month number,” Lazar said, referring to the jobs report on Friday. “This has been a rising trend.”

The recent labor market cooldown took hold roughly two years after the Federal Reserve began raising interest rates in March 2022 as part of an effort to dial back inflation. On average, Lazar said, the economy dips into a recession two-and-a-half years after the Fed begins a series of rate hikes.

“We’ve been expecting a recession to unfold,” Lazar added, acknowledging that Piper Sandler had previously forecasted a recession as early as the end of 2023. The firm had erred in part because it underestimated the staying power of pandemic-era government stimulus, she said.

“We’re now at the highest risk of the economy moving into a recession,” she added.

On Sunday, Goldman Sachs economists raised the probability of a U.S. recession in the next year from 15% to 25%.

The market downturn has triggered calls for a large interest rate cut at the Fed’s next meeting in September. Some investors have voiced an even more urgent request for a rare emergency rate cut as soon as this week.

In theory, interest rate cuts would ease borrowing fees, unleash consumer demand and business investment and help the economy avert a downturn.

Economists, however, said an interest rate cut likely would not help the economy avoid an imminent recession, since rate changes typically affect the economy only after a period of several months.

Pointing to the market drop-off on Monday, economists said investors have a track record of overreacting to emerging trends in the economy. But, experts added, market swings can help bring about a recession anyway.

“Markets always tend to overreact to the upside and overreact to the downside,” said Sonola, adding that market sentiment may in turn weigh on business investment and economic activity. “It can be a self-reinforcing feedback loop.”

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(NEW YORK) — Stocks plummeted on Monday as markets worldwide reckoned with a disappointing jobs report last week that fueled concern of a possible recession.

The major stock indexes in the U.S. fell more than 2% in early trading. The S&P 500 fell about 4%, while the tech-heavy Nasdaq dropped more than 6%. The Dow Jones Industrial Average fell roughly 1,000 points, or nearly 3%.

The market downturn triggered calls for a large interest rate cut at the Federal Reserve’s next meeting in September. Some investors voiced an even more urgent request for a rare emergency rate cut as soon as this week.

Japan’s main Nikkei 225 stock index dropped more than 12%, its worst day of trading since 1987.

In early U.S. trading, chipmaker Nvidia plunged more than 14%. Apple fell more than 8%.

“Investors are feeling massive pain globally,” Dan Ives, a managing director of equity research at investment firm Wedbush, said in a note to clients. 

U.S. markets, he added, are “trading heavy in the red across the board.”

Employers hired 114,000 workers in July, falling well short of economist expectations of 185,000 jobs added, U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics data on Friday showed. The unemployment rate climbed to 4.3%, the highest level since October 2021.

The unemployment rate has soared this year from 3.7% to 4.3%. That trend has triggered a recession indicator known as the “Sahm Rule,” which says that a rise of 0.5 percentage points in the unemployment rate within a 12-month period typically precedes a recession.

On Sunday, Goldman Sachs economists raised the probability of a U.S. recession in the next year from 15% to 25%.

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(NEW YORK) — Stock futures plummeted on Monday as markets reckoned with a disappointing jobs report last week that fueled concern of a possible recession.

Each of the major stock indexes fell more than 2% in pre-market trading on Monday. The tech-heavy Nasdaq dropped nearly 6%.

The market downturn triggered calls for a large interest rate cut at the Federal Reserve’s next meeting in September. Some investors voiced an even more urgent request for a rare emergency rate cut as soon as this week.

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(NEW YORK) — The major stock indexes dropped significantly on Friday after a weaker-than-expected jobs report stoked worries of a possible recession.

In early trading, the S&P 500 was on pace for its worst trading day in about two years. The Dow Jones Industrial Average had fallen nearly 800 points, or about 2%. The tech-heavy Nasdaq had fared even worse, dropping more than 2%.

The stock decline on Friday followed unsteady performance over roughly the past month. Until then, stocks had enjoyed strong gains this year.

From the outset of 2024 through Thursday, the S&P 500 had climbed more than 15%. The Dow Jones Industrial Average and the Nasdaq had also seen double-digit increases.

The selloff is concerning since it’s rooted in a labor market cooldown that may signal a wider economic downturn, investors told ABC News. However, the solid state of the economy may very well allow it to weather the difficulty and send stocks back toward gains.

“We don’t think it’s the start of a bear market,” Adam Turnquist, chief technical strategist at LPL Financial, told ABC News, ruling out the possibility of an outcome in which a stock index has dropped 20% below its most recent high.

“Today’s weaker economic data is certainly concerning,” Turnquist added. “We don’t think it’s pointing to an imminent recession, but it certainly changes the narrative.”

A weaker-than-expected jobs report is fueling concern about a potential recession and calls for an interest rate cut.

Employers hired 114,000 workers last month, falling well short of economist expectations of 185,000 jobs, U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics data showed. The unemployment rate climbed to 4.3%, the highest level since October 2021.

Still, the unemployment rate remains at a relatively low level in historical terms. Gross domestic product data last week showed that the U.S. economy grew much faster than expected over three months ending in June, according to the Commerce Department.

“The stock market is churning as investors try to figure out if current valuations are justified given the softening economic data seen in recent months,” Clark Bellin, president and chief investment officer at Nebraska-based Bellwether Wealth, told ABC News in a statement.

“Stock market volatility is very normal, and we believe the economy is still on a sound footing,” Bellin added.

The fresh jobs data extends a monthslong stretch of economic performance marked by the key conditions for a rate cut: falling inflation and slowing job gains.

In recent months, Fed Chair Jerome Powell has shifted focus to the central bank’s responsibility for maintaining a robust job market, in addition to its goal of controlling inflation.

“For a long time, since inflation arrived, it’s been right to mainly focus on inflation. But now that inflation has come down and the labor market has indeed cooled off, we’re going to be looking at both mandates,” Powell said last month at a meeting of The Economic Club of Washington, D.C.

On Wednesday, Powell said the Fed may cut interest rates at its next meeting in September, though he said the central bank would like to see further evidence that inflation is heading downward.

An interest rate cut would ease borrowing costs for consumers and businesses alike, which may rekindle economic activity and boost hiring.

Chris Zaccarelli, chief investment officer at North Carolina-based Independent Advisor Alliance, said it’s too early to tell whether the underwhelming jobs report on Friday foretells sustained losses for the stock market.

“If it turns out that this is just some noise in the labor market data and that stabilizes — similar to how we had some noise in the inflation data earlier this year before that stabilized — then this will be looked back at as a temporary period of weakness in the economy and stock market,” Zaccarelli told ABC News.

“However, if this is a beginning of a turn in the economy for the worse, then all bets are off,” Zaccarelli added.

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(WASHINGTON) — Former President Donald Trump this week voiced an alarming claim about the alleged threat that immigrants pose to Black workers.

“Coming from the border are millions and millions of people who happen to be taking Black jobs,” Trump said at a gathering of the National Association of Black Journalists in Chicago. “They’re taking the employment from Black people.”

Trump has delivered the same dire warning about an immigrant threat to Black employment on multiple occasions throughout the 2024 campaign, including at a debate with President Joe Biden in June.

Economists who spoke to ABC News dismissed the claim as false. In fact, they said, a tight job market in recent years delivered record-low Black unemployment and spurred rapid wage gains.

“The claim is absolutely not true,” Valerie Wilson, the director of a program on race, ethnicity and the economy at the left-leaning Economic Policy Institute Action, told ABC News.

In a statement to ABC News, the Trump campaign claimed that undocumented immigrants pose a threat to Black employment.

“Illegal immigration disproportionally affects Black workers, including other minority workers, and we need to do everything to protect them from their jobs from being taken away,” Trump campaign spokesperson Steven Cheung said.

Cheung noted that the the current Black unemployment rate of 6.3% is higher than its lowest level under Trump of 5.3%. Inflation-adjusted weekly earnings for Black workers currently stand lower than they did at their high point under Trump, Cheung added.

“That is why President Trump has promised the largest deportation operation in American history since President Dwight D. Eisenhower. Kamala Harris will give amnesty and citizenship to all 15 million illegal aliens and make permanent the assault on Black American jobs,” Cheung added.

The all-time lowest figure for Black unemployment recorded in a single month registered at 4.8% in April 2023 during Biden’s term. Last year, the average Black unemployment rate stood at 5.5%, setting a record for the lowest figure over a calendar year, U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics data shows.

To be sure, the unemployment rate stood much higher than the 3.3% unemployment rate among white workers in 2023. Historically, the Black unemployment rate has clocked in roughly twice as high as that of white people, due in large part to continued racial discrimination among employers, economists previously told ABC News.

Another key metric has shown robust job gains among Black workers. Last year, the share of job holders between the ages of 25 to 54 — known as the “prime age” for workers — reached an all-time high of nearly 78% among Black people, the Economic Policy Institute found. That statistic helps correct for issues such as aging or higher education that can skew unemployment statistics.

“The bottom line is immigrants aren’t pushing out Black workers,” Christian Weller, a professor of public policy at the University of Massachusetts at Boston who studies racial disparities in employment, told ABC News.

“It isn’t particularly surprising,” Weller added. That’s because immigrants act not only as workers but also as consumers, helping fuel demand for goods and services, which in turn propels economic activity and drives up hiring, he said.

The economy has grown at a solid pace in recent years, defying fears among some observers of a potential slowdown. Gross domestic product expanded much faster than expected over three months ending in June, U.S. Commerce Department data last week showed.

In June, a budget outlook released by the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office said immigration would account for a sizable share of U.S. economic growth over the coming decade. In all, the U.S. GDP will rise nearly $9 trillion higher than it would otherwise due to an anticipated influx of immigrants, the CBO found.

“At the heart of this question is not just that these are people who are filling jobs that need to be filled, but they are also paying taxes, raising their families, and spending in the neighborhoods and communist in which they live,” Michelle Holder, a labor economist at John Jay College of Criminal Justice, told ABC News.

When speaking about the issue this week, Trump falsely characterized immigrants as a threat to “Black jobs.” That phrase “Black jobs,” which Trump used previously, drew condemnation from some economists.

Holder, who is also Black, said the term invokes a period of U.S. history that predates anti-discrimination laws, when some job listings explicitly described jobs as available only to Black applicants.

“I get a visceral reaction because there was a time in this country when there was work considered only suitable for Black people,” Holder said.

When asked about the phrase on Wednesday at the gathering of the National Association of Black Journalists, Trump said: “A Black job is anybody that has a job. That’s what it is.”

Wilson, of Economic Policy Institute Action, also criticized the phrase, in part because it fails to acknowledge the issue of “occupational segregation,” in which employers tend to place Black workers in low-wage positions rather than high-wage ones. The U.S., she added, has made progress in addressing that trend in recent years, though it remains an impediment for wage gains among Black workers.

“It’s just a very poor choice of words in terms of trying to say anything about the labor market, and it’s a poor choice of words in particular because it’s offensive,” said Wilson, who is Black.

“It totally ignores the facts about the current economy and the improvement that we’ve seen over the last four years,” Wilson added.

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(WASHINGTON) — A weaker-than-expected jobs report on Friday fueled concern about a potential economic recession and calls for an interest rate cut.

Employers hired 114,000 workers last month, falling well short of economist expectations of 185,000 jobs, U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics data showed. The unemployment rate climbed to 4.3%, the highest level since October 2021.

The hiring in July marked a steep slowdown from the 206,000 jobs added over the previous month, and the new data came in well below the monthly average over the past year.

The cooldown of the job market foretells a possible economic downturn and bolsters the case for an interest rate cut at the Federal Reserve’s next meeting in September, analysts told ABC News. The central bank may have erred in holding interest rates steady at its meeting this week, some analysts added.

“The labor market is in a perilous spot,” Nick Bunker, economic research director for North America at Indeed Hiring Lab, told ABC News in a statement. “It’s not clear what changes and rescues it from its current trajectory.”

The report on Friday indicates that the job market is cooling faster than previously known, rekindling fears of a recession, some analysts said.

The unemployment rate has soared this year from 3.7% to 4.3%. That trend has triggered a recession indicator known as the “Sahm Rule,” which says that a rise of 0.5 percentage points in the unemployment rate within a 12-month period typically precedes a recession.

The major stock indexes fell in early trading on Friday in response to the jobs data.

“The July employment report landed with a loud thud,” Mark Hamrick, senior economic analyst at Bankrate, told ABC News.

In a post on X regarding the jobs data, prominent economist and New York Times opinion writer Paul Krugman described the economy as “pre-recessionary,” though he indicated that the economy will likely avert a downturn due to some technical reasons for the elevated unemployment rate.

Citing a need to rekindle job growth, however, Krugman called on the Fed to “cut, cut, cut.”

The fresh jobs data extends a monthslong stretch of economic performance marked by the key conditions for a rate cut: falling inflation and slowing job gains.

Price increases have slowed significantly from a peak of more than 9%, though inflation remains a percentage point higher than the Fed’s target rate of 2%. An outright drop in prices in June compared to the month prior marked a major sign of progress in slowing inflation.

In recent months, Fed Chair Jerome Powell has shifted focus to the central bank’s responsibility for maintaining a robust job market, in addition to its goal of controlling inflation.

“For a long time, since inflation arrived, it’s been right to mainly focus on inflation. But now that inflation has come down and the labor market has indeed cooled off, we’re going to be looking at both mandates,” Powell said last month at a meeting of The Economic Club of Washington, D.C.

On Wednesday, Powell said the Fed may cut interest rates at its next meeting in September, though he said the central bank would like to see further evidence that inflation is heading downward.

“We’ve made no decisions about future meetings and that includes the September meeting,” Powell said at a press conference in Washington D.C. “We’re getting closer to the point at which we’ll reduce our policy rate, but we’re not quite at that point yet.”

In recent months, observers voiced optimism about the possibility of a “soft landing,” in which inflation returns to normal levels while the economy averts a recession. However, the jobs report appeared to sour some of that enthusiasm.

“The soft landing in the U.S. labor market is in danger,” said Bunker.

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(NEW YORK) — Less than a week after Elon Musk publicly endorsed the candidacy of former President Donald Trump, he shared an edited video of Vice President Kamala Harris that used artificial intelligence to mimic her voice.

Musk, the wealthiest person in the world, spread the video on his social media platform X, where he boasts 192 million followers. The post appeared to violate X policies that disallow sharing “synthetic, manipulated or out-of-context media.” Later, Musk defended the video as parody, which is permitted on the platform when adequately labeled.

A similar firestorm broke out this week after X suspended an account affiliated with a fundraising drive in support of Harris called “White Dudes for Kamala.”

A message from X indicated that the account had been suspended for “violating our rules against evading suspension,” according to a screenshot posted by an event organizer. X, which plays host to nearly 250 million users, later reinstated the account.

The incidents stoked concern among some experts about the potential for Musk to wield X as a means of influencing public conversation about an election in which he holds a clear preference.

“It’s an unsettling situation,” Paul Barrett, a professor at New York University Law School and deputy director of the NYU Stern Center for Business and Human Rights, told ABC News. “It illustrates the power that can reside in the hands of a single individual because of the almost bizarre way our current communications architecture is structured.”

Some experts disagreed, however, saying critics lack evidence of Musk’s undue intervention at X. They also downplayed the role X plays in the wider political conversation, noting that a focus on the platform risks overstating Musk’s influence.

“I actually don’t think his ownership of Twitter or activities on Twitter make the slightest bit of difference,” Siva Vaidyanathan, professor of media studies at the University of Virginia, told ABC News, referring to the platform by its former name.

X did not immediately respond to ABC News’ request for comment. The request also sought comment from Musk.

When Musk acquired Twitter in 2022, he vowed to relax content moderation and turn the platform into a “digital town square.” The company cut more than half of its staff, eased restrictions on some forms of speech and reinstated an account belonging to Trump, among other changes.

Meanwhile, Musk’s follower count soared. When he acquired Twitter, Musk had about 110 million followers. After adding more than 80 million followers, Musk has far surpassed the followings of top users like former President Barack Obama and pop star Justin Bieber.

In some cases, Musk has posted and amplified misinformation on X, including a post in January that falsely claimed a dependence on mail-in ballots would lead to a “rigged election.”

“As the owner of Twitter, he’s the person who’s supposed to police the content but he himself is engaging in the spread of fake information,” Hamed Qahri-Saremi, a professor of computer information systems at Colorado State University who studies social media, told ABC News.

After easing content moderation, the platform has come to rely on Community Notes, a system in which context is appended to false or misleading posts once it receives approval from a sufficient number of users. That system has proven inconsistent, however, allowing some false posts to spread widely without corrections, The New York Times reported last week.

Sam Woolley, a professor at the University of Texas School of Journalism who focuses on political communication and technology, said Musk’s commitment to free speech has fallen short in recent cases, for instance the temporary suspension of the account affiliated with “White Dudes for Harris.”

“Musk’s actions suggest serious contradictions with his stated free speech intentions on the platform,” Woolley told ABC News.

Some experts sharply disagreed with criticism of Musk regarding his oversight of X, saying he hasn’t interfered with the platform in a manner that suggests an intent to reward his political allies or punish his foes.

“Has Elon come out and specifically set a policy or rule for X that in turn would then say he’s abusing that power?” asked Jason Buckweitz, a professor of business at Columbia University who studies the digital economy. “I haven’t seen any evidence.”

“I don’t necessarily think it’s a concern unless there’s some level of negative influence,” Buckweitz added.

Plus, observers should not assume that Musk’s large follower count translates into immense impact, said Vaidyanathan, noting that some of the followers are likely bots and inactive users.

“The very exposure to or posting of something doesn’t mean that anybody saw it or believed it,” Vaidyanathan said. Many of the followers are likely supporters of Musk who would already back his preferred candidate anyway, he added.

For his part, Vaidyanathan said Musk still wields significant political influence as the owner of aerospace company Space X, which has current contracts with the U.S. government.

Joshua Tucker, director of the Center for Social Media and Politics at New York University, said Musk’s dual role as an owner and user of X raises a policy question surrounding the regulation of social media platforms.

Tucker, who declined to say whether X warrants government regulation, pointed to a law calling for the ban or sale of TikTok as an example of the federal government weighing in on social media. On Wednesday, the Senate passed bipartisan legislation that aims to protect children’s safety on social media, signaling further willingness to police the platforms.

“We continue to live in an era where we have to think very carefully as a country about what types of public policies to regulate the behavior of social media companies in terms of public health but also the information ecosystem,” Tucker said.

Speaking about Musk’s dual role on X, Tucker added: “If this is something the public finds objectionable, that’s ultimately a public policy question.”

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