The Trump administration has instructed state labor officials to not release unemployment numbers, in a clear effort to minimize the severity of the impact the coronavirus pandemic is having on the markets.

The New York Times reports the U.S. Dept. of Labor “instructed state officials to only ‘provide information using generalities to describe claims levels (very high, large increase)’ until the department releases the total number of national claims next Thursday.”

Gay Gilbert, the administrator of the department’s Office of Employment Insurance in an email instructed: “States should not provide numeric values to the public,” The Times notes.

The U.S. Secretary of Labor is headed by Eugene Scalia (photo), who happens to be the son of the late Supreme Court Justice, Antonin Scalia.