Trump gives economy speech in Pennsylvania amid affordability fear
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President Donald Trump is scheduled to deliver remarks on the U.S. economy as he works to sell a message of economic success to a country increasingly concerned about the cost of living.
The speech in Mount Pocono, Pennsylvania, comes as data show Americans feeling squeezed by high prices, which continue to creep up despite Trump’s insistence that he has all but conquered inflation.
The most recent consumer confidence survey for November found economic sentiment falling to its lowest point in seven months.
And while the inflation rate has retreated from its highs during the middle of the Biden administration, it remains on an upward trajectory. The most recent year-over-year consumer price index reading, of 3% in September, is the same level as where it stood in January.
Democrats, who hope to retake majority control of at least one chamber of Congress in the 2026 midterms, have focused intently on a message of affordability, while blaming Trump’s tariffs and other economic policies for high prices.
Trump has chafed at that messaging, asserting that affordability is a “Democrat hoax” and that he is cleaning up his predecessor’s economic mess.
In an interview with Politico on Monday, Trump said he would give his economy a grade of “A-plus-plus-plus-plus-plus.”
The domestic trip to a key swing state marks a return to the sort of voter outreach that defined Trump’s political campaigns, but has grown rarer during the 79-year-old’s first year back in the White House.
