{"id":7276,"date":"2025-11-09T19:38:16","date_gmt":"2025-11-09T19:38:16","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/wpinitiate.com\/echo-test\/demo973e36f5\/2025\/11\/09\/trump-officials-paint-a-rosy-picture-of-affordability-heres-the-reality-rolling-stone\/"},"modified":"2025-11-09T19:38:16","modified_gmt":"2025-11-09T19:38:16","slug":"trump-officials-paint-a-rosy-picture-of-affordability-heres-the-reality-rolling-stone","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/wpinitiate.com\/echo-test\/demo973e36f5\/2025\/11\/09\/trump-officials-paint-a-rosy-picture-of-affordability-heres-the-reality-rolling-stone\/","title":{"rendered":"Trump Officials Paint a Rosy Picture of Affordability. Here\u2019s the Reality – Rolling Stone"},"content":{"rendered":"
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\u201cIf you look at affordability, which [Democrats] campaigned on, they lied,\u201d Trump said. The numbers show he and his administration are the ones lying about rising costs<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n

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\tAfter Democrats won big last Tuesday campaigning on the issue of the affordability crisis, Trump and his administration officials are trying to paint a positive but inaccurate picture of economic indicators.<\/p>\n

\t\u201cI will say this: If you look at affordability, which they campaigned on, they lied,\u201d Trump said on Friday of the Democrats\u2019 electoral wins. \u201cBecause they talked about, \u2018Oh, prices are up.\u2019 No, no. Prices are down under the Trump administration. And they\u2019re down substantially.\u201d<\/p>\n

\tMeanwhile, Trump administration officials took to the Sunday news shows to spread the message of good economic cheer. But actual economic indicators, such as the 3 percent inflation<\/a> the U.S. saw in September, point to rising prices, although it wasn\u2019t as bad as the 3.1 percent economists had predicted. When Trump first announced his tariffs in April, inflation was at 2.3 percent. In September alone, consumer prices rose<\/a> .3 percent, and prices increased for four of the six major grocery store food groups. We won\u2019t know the October numbers until Nov. 13. \t<\/p>\n

\tTrump\u2019s director of the National Economic Council, Kevin Hassett<\/a>, claimed that grocery prices are down, even though the evidence does not support that assertion.<\/p>\n

\t\u201cGrocery prices are down significantly under Trump\u2026 People are right to feel stretched but we\u2019re making progress\u2026 Inflation is under control and the economy<\/a> is booming,\u201d Hassett said on CBS\u2019s Face the Nation<\/em>. \u201cWe understand why people are still hurting because we haven\u2019t made up all the room that was lost under Joe Biden.\u201d \t<\/p>\n

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Kevin Hasset straight up lies: “Grocery prices are down significantly under Trump\u2026 People are right to feel stretched but we’re making progress\u2026 Inflation is under control and the economy is booming. We understand why people are still hurting because we haven’t made up all\u2026 pic.twitter.com\/JIf2H9lSax<\/a><\/p>\n

\u2014 Ron Smith (@Ronxyz00) November 9, 2025<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote><\/div>\n<\/figure>\n

\tTrump and his officials have also tried to push the idea that the punitive tariffs they imposed on foreign imports are somehow going to enrich Americans. This contradicts the truth, which is that the Trump tariffs are raising consumer prices.<\/p>\n

\t\u201cPeople that are against Tariffs are FOOLS! \u2026 A dividend of at least $2,000 a person (not including high income people!) will be paid to everyone,\u201d Trump promised<\/a> in a Truth Social post on Sunday. When ABC\u2019s This Week<\/em> host George Stephanopoulos asked Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent<\/a> about Trump\u2019s claim, Bessent was evasive. <\/p>\n

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\t \t\tEditor\u2019s picks \t \t<\/h2>\n<\/section>\n
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\u201cWe are making substantial progress \u2026 Over the coming months and next year, prices are going to come down.\u201d<\/p>\n

With the economy proving to be a driving force for voters. George Stephanopoulos presses Sec. Bessent on the GOP\u2019s plan to lower prices. https:\/\/t.co\/fthuOU60x8<\/a> pic.twitter.com\/tQJwC7FWYg<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

\u2014 This Week (@ThisWeekABC) November 9, 2025<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote><\/div>\n<\/figure>\n

\t\u201cI haven\u2019t spoken to the president about this yet,\u201d he said, adding, \u201cThe $2,000 dividend could come in lots of forms and lots of ways.\u201d<\/p>\n

\tBessent then went on to mention that the administration\u2019s cessation of taxes on tips and overtime could make up that dividend, which is very different from tariffs. Bessent has admitted in the past <\/a>that Americans are the ones who end up paying for tariffs.<\/p>\n

\tThe White House account on X, formerly Twitter, also tried to gaslight Americans into believing grocery prices are more affordable now than under Biden. In a Sunday post<\/a>, the White House claimed that Thanksgiving dinner is 25 percent cheaper now compared to last year. That is likely based on the cost of Walmart\u2019s promotional Thanksgiving meal basket. But if you compare the goods included in the basket this year compared to last, there are significant differences. This year\u2019s basket only has 15 products, whereas last year\u2019s had 21. This year\u2019s basket also contains more products from Walmart\u2019s Great Value brand, which is cheaper than the name brands in last year\u2019s dinner. But, the retailer says, the 2025 basket will feed 10 people compared to last year\u2019s eight. The bottom line is that it\u2019s not a fair comparison and is therefore an inaccurate measure of grocery affordability. Trump, meanwhile, has dismissed<\/a> this criticism as \u201cfake news.\u201d But if we look at grocery prices across the board in September, they were approximately 2.7 percent higher than last year and 1.4 percent higher than January 2025, according<\/a> to CNN. <\/p>\n

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\t \t\tRelated Content \t \t<\/h2>\n<\/section>\n

\tThe post additionally claims that the \u201cnational average of gasoline dropped $3 in the first week of November.\u201d The way it\u2019s worded, it sounds like gas prices decreased by $3 per gallon. In reality, gas prices dropped below <\/em>$3 per gallon in that time period, according to <\/a>GasBuddy (AAA\u2019s average for that week, however, was above $3 per gallon<\/a>). Regardless, gas prices certainly did not drop by $3 per gallon. \t<\/p>\n

\tAnother false claim in the post boasts 2.5 percent inflation in September, which is true if we\u2019re talking about Sept. 2024<\/a>, when Biden was president.<\/p>\n

\tTrump, though, sounds like he wants to bury his head in the sand rather than hear about the economic reality that is causing many Americans to struggle.<\/p>\n

\t\u201cI don\u2019t want to hear about the affordability,\u201d Trump said Thursday at the White House when a reporter asked about the elections and voters\u2019 affordability concerns. <\/p>\n

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\t \t\tTrending Stories \t \t<\/h2>\n<\/section>\n

\tBut even conservative media are calling Republicans out for their lies. <\/p>\n

\t\u201cGrocery prices are going up. And now Republicans are perversely doing the same thing Democrats did when they were in office with Joe Biden, saying, \u2018No, actually, don\u2019t believe your eyes at the grocery store, prices are coming down!\u2019\u201d conservative radio host Erick Erickson said last week<\/a>. \u201cThat\u2019s not helpful to Americans who are feeling higher grocery costs right now, which is actually happening. The Republicans have gotta figure this out.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

\u201cIf you look at affordability, which [Democrats] campaigned on, they lied,\u201d Trump said. The numbers show he and his administration are the ones lying about rising costs After Democrats won big last Tuesday campaigning on the issue of the affordability crisis, Trump and his administration officials are trying to paint a positive but inaccurate picture […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":7277,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-7276","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/wpinitiate.com\/echo-test\/demo973e36f5\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7276","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/wpinitiate.com\/echo-test\/demo973e36f5\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/wpinitiate.com\/echo-test\/demo973e36f5\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wpinitiate.com\/echo-test\/demo973e36f5\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wpinitiate.com\/echo-test\/demo973e36f5\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=7276"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/wpinitiate.com\/echo-test\/demo973e36f5\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7276\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wpinitiate.com\/echo-test\/demo973e36f5\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/7277"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/wpinitiate.com\/echo-test\/demo973e36f5\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=7276"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wpinitiate.com\/echo-test\/demo973e36f5\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=7276"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wpinitiate.com\/echo-test\/demo973e36f5\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=7276"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}