By Trevor Hunnicutt and Tim Reid
ROME, Georgia, Feb 19 (Reuters) – President Donald Trump insisted on Thursday his policies were easing high prices, seeking to persuade voters frustrated by the cost of living that he and fellow Republicans have an effective economic plan ahead of November’s midterm elections.
Speaking at a steel distributor in Rome, Georgia, Trump touted a growing stock market, his tariff policy on foreign goods and increased foreign investment in the U.S. economy.
“What word have you not heard over the last two weeks? Affordability. Because I’ve won. I’ve won affordability,” Trump said. “I had to go out and talk about it.”
Trump won re-election in 2024 in large part because of his promise to reduce inflation, but he has been struggling to convince Americans that he is making inroads in bringing down high prices, public opinion polls show.
Voter angst about persistently high costs has emerged as a threat to Republicans’ control of Congress ahead of the November elections.
Although Trump is not on the ballot in November, he has become his party’s chief messenger on the cost of living. But his recent speeches on the economy have been at times meandering, off-message and have rarely acknowledged the strain many Americans say they still feel at the grocery store.
In a Reuters analysis this month of five speeches on the economy that Trump has given since December, he asserted that inflation had been beaten or was way down almost 20 times and said prices were falling almost 30 times, assertions at odds with economic data and voters’ daily experiences.
In Georgia on Thursday, Trump pressed the message that he had put the country back on track.
“We inherited a mess with high prices and high inflation, and we’ve turned it around and we’ve made it great,” he said. “Air fares, hotels, car payments, rent, sports events, groceries, everything’s down.”
The overall yearly inflation rate in January was 2.4%, down from 2.7% in December. But food inflation was almost 3% over the past year, meaning Americans are paying more for grocery staples, while housing costs have also risen.
Job creation under Trump has also slowed substantially, and surveys show Americans are increasingly pessimistic about job prospects and job security.
Republican strategists have told Reuters that Trump’s mixed messaging on an issue that is angering voters risks creating a credibility gap for him and the Republican Party ahead of the midterm elections.
Republicans hold a razor-thin majority in the U.S. House of Representatives, and are in danger of losing it, while Democrats need a net gain of four seats to retake the Senate, a more challenging task given the number of seats they are defending.
Trump’s approval rating on his handling of the economy was 34% according to a new Reuters/Ipsos poll released this week, down from 36% last month. Some 57% of respondents disapprove of his job performance on the economy.
Trump on Thursday touted his tax cuts that kicked in last month and will produce greater savings for tens of millions of families, as well as the scrapping of taxes on tips, overtime and Social Security payments.
He has also been presenting plans to lower mortgage interest rates and housing prices, and deals with health insurance companies to reduce drug prices.
On several occasions, Trump complained about the possibility of the U.S. Supreme Court blocking his policy of imposing widespread tariffs on foreign goods, a cornerstone of his economic policy. The court is considering whether Trump had the legal authority to impose the sweeping tariffs on imports from many countries.
“I’m waiting for a decision from the Supreme Court. Can you imagine we have to wait? Trump said.
Trump delivered his speech in a deeply conservative district that was represented by Marjorie Taylor Greene. Once a fierce Trump loyalist, Greene resigned her congressional seat in January after a bitter split with the president.
A special election to fill Greene’s seat will be held on March 10. Trump has endorsed Clay Fuller, a local prosecutor, in an attempt to clear the field. But his backing has not deterred 14 other Republicans from entering the race, turning the contest into an election-year test of Trump’s hold on his Make America Great Again movement.
“You better win that election,” Trump told Fuller, who was in the audience.
(Reporting by Trevor Hunnicutt in Rome and Tim Reid in Washington; Additional reporting by Nandita Bose and Ismail Shakil; Editing by Ross Colvin, Colleen Jenkins and Alistair Bell)
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