For months, U.S. President Donald Trump has stubbornly denied that prices have skyrocketed during his term. Time and again, he has urged citizens to trust him, not their wallets, when they go to the checkout and find that everything is more expensive. On Tuesday, he attempted to shift his strategy with a speech about the state of the economy and his administration’s measures to make products more affordable.

A casino in the Pocono Mountains of Pennsylvania, in a county that supported Joe Biden in 2020 and helped give Trump the electoral victory last year, was the chosen venue for the speech — the first openly political address the president has delivered in months outside Washington and its surroundings.

But the new message — that yes, the president admits affordability is a problem (caused by Joe Biden’s previous administration, the president specifies) and that his administration is taking steps to fix it — was contradicted just hours earlier by Trump himself. In an interview with Politico, recorded on Monday and published this Tuesday, the Republican gave himself an “A-plus-plus-plus-plus-plus” grade for his economic management

The president himself insisted in his speech on Tuesday — which, as usual, he improvised — that affordability “is a hoax.” Trump argued: ”Prices are coming down very substantially. But they have a new word, you know? They always have a hoax. The new word is affordability."

He continued: “They gave you the highest inflation in history, and we’re […] bringing those prices down rapidly, lower prices, bigger paychecks, you’re getting lower prices. Bigger paychecks, we’re getting inflation, we’re crushing it."

Before Trump departed for Pennsylvania, White House spokesman Kush Desai said that “much work remains” but that “putting an end to Joe Biden’s inflation and affordability crisis has been a Day One priority for President Trump.” Desai listed the administration’s efforts, including “slashing costly regulations to securing historic drug pricing deals, efforts that have cooled inflation and raised real wages.”

During the 2024 presidential campaign, Trump based his campaign message on promises to lower prices and usher in a golden age for families. This message secured his victory: poll after poll consistently identified economic concerns as the key issue for U.S. voters, with a majority believing Republicans were better equipped to manage the nation’s finances.

But despite Trump’s insistence that the country’s economic problems have been solved since he took office, the data suggests otherwise. Measures such as the widespread tariffs imposed by the Republican, or the spending cuts and mass layoffs in the public sector, appear to have begun to take their toll.

Unemployment is rising: in November, the private sector lost 32,000 jobs, marking the sixth consecutive month of job losses. Consumer confidence is at rock bottom, and citizens’ perception of their financial situation is at its lowest level since 2009, according to calculations by the University of Michigan. Inflation, which had begun to come under control in the latter part of Biden’s term, has risen again. In September, the most recent month for which data is available, prices had increased by 3% compared to the same month of the previous year.

After months in the political wilderness, the Democratic opposition has found that focusing on affordability is its best chance to regain popularity at the polls. The Democrats won various elections last November — from the New York City mayoral race to thegovernorships of Virginia and New Jersey — largely thanks to their economic message. On Tuesday, the party achieved another milestone: Democrat candidate Elieen Higgins won the Miami mayoral election, ending three decades of uninterrupted Republican rule in Florida’s largest city.

The White House promises that Trump’s speech on Tuesday will not be the last, but rather the first in a campaign to explain the administration’s economic strategy to Americans, before the midterm elections next November, in which control of both houses of Congress will be at stake.

Over the past few weeks, as polls indicated a decline in Trump’s popularity, the White House has announced relief measures, such as reduced tariffs on certain food products and a $12 billion injection for the agricultural sector. It has also lowered fuel efficiency standards for vehicles to reduce car prices, and announced with great fanfare agreements with pharmaceutical companies to lower the cost of some medications.

“We inherited a mess on affordability,” Trump declared Monday during an event to announce aid to farmers. “You can call it affordability or anything you want, but the Democrats caused the affordability problem, and we’re the ones that are fixing it.”

But polls indicate that the percentage of Americans who blame Trump and his administration for the country’s economic problems is on the rise. A survey published by *Politico *last week puts that group at 46%. The same poll found that 37% of Republican voters believe the cost of living is the worst they can remember.

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