It’s been reported by the Bureau of Labor Statistics that the African American unemployment rate is a just above 13 percent, the second lowest number since the Obama administration took office in 2009. Although higher than the overall unemployment rate, it does show improvement for a long suffering demographic. But, with the positive comes the negative as the right-wing is skeptical about how the positive numbers were obtained.

With 227,000 jobs added to the U.S. economy as of February, skeptics don’t understand how the Black unemployment rate rose dramatically from 14.1percent from 13.6 percent. Rep. Allen West (R-FL) said, “If the national average only went down two tenths of a percentage point then how could — all of these 240,000 new jobs must have come from in the Black community.” Instead of being celebratory about the new stats, Democrats had to reassure Republicans that they are indeed accurate. “No way [were numbers cooked],” said Rep. Ed Towns (D-NY) who represents the largest Black area of New York City, “There are way too many people involved.”