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(WASHINGTON) — President Donald Trump said during his presidential address on Wednesday night that his administration is “bringing our economy back from the brink of ruin,” claiming that he has brought prices down across the board.

“I am bringing those high prices down and bringing them down very fast,” Trump said from the White House’s Diplomatic Room, adding, “Let’s look at the facts.”

He made sweeping claims about prices — from gasoline and groceries to airfare and hotel flights — comparing the current price to that of former President Joe Biden’s administration.

But according to the most recent data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics, the president’s claims in some cases appeared to be exaggerated, false or unverifiable.

BLS is set to release updated numbers on Thursday providing an updated look at consumer prices — the first inflation report since the end of the government shutdown.

The president said that under Biden, gasoline prices rose 30 to 50%, hotel rates rose 37% and airfares rose 31%.

“Now, under our leadership, they are all coming down and coming down fast. Democrat politicians also sent the cost of groceries soaring, but we are solving that, too,” Trump claimed.

Trump claimed that egg prices are down 82% since March and that “everything else is falling rapidly.”

ABC News has compiled fact checks on some of Trump’s claims.

Gas prices

It’s true that gas prices hit an all-time high in June 2022 under Biden, with an average price of $5.016 per gallon, per AAA.

According to AAA, the new average is $2.998. That would be an almost 50% decrease from the highest point under the Biden administration.

But when you compare gas prices to where they were just a year ago, Sept. 2025 to Sept. 2024, the latest CPI report puts gas down just .5%.

Airfare

Airline fares were up 3.2% in September under the Trump administration compared to a year earlier, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics.

Hotel rates

Hotel room rates are down .8% and car rental prices are down 5.0% over the past year, per BLS data.

Groceries

The average price of a dozen grade A eggs was $3.49 as of September, down from an all-time high of $6.23 in March — a 43% decrease, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics.

It’s important to note, also, that egg prices were heavily affected by the avian flu.

Overall, meat prices have gone up 8.5% in the past year, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics.

Beef prices are at a record high — up 14.7% in the past year.

Notably, Trump also doesn’t mention coffee. Coffee is up 18.9%, according to BLS data from September, the most recent available. The price of coffee has risen in part due to the president’s tariffs on places like Brazil — although last month the White House began exempting coffee from his tariffs.

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(WASHINGTON) — President Donald Trump is taking his message and vision on the economy directly to voters — but he faces an American public that, recent polling shows, feels largely negative toward how the president has handled economic issues.

“Here at home, we’re bringing our economy back from the brink of ruin,” Trump said during a primetime address to the nation on Wednesday night.

Vice President JD Vance also travelled to Allentown, Pennsylvania, on Tuesday to talk about the White House’s economic vision — just one week after Trump paid his own visit to the Keystone State for remarks on the economy.

But a Quinnipiac University poll published on Wednesday found that almost 6 in 10 registered voters disapprove of how Trump has handled the economy, while 65% say the state of the American economy is “not so good” or “poor.”

Quinnipiac University’s poll also found that 57% of registered voters think Trump is more responsible for the economy’s state right now, and 34% of voters think former President Joe Biden is.

Last week, Reuters and Ipsos published a poll that found that only 31% of Americans approve of how Trump has handled the cost of living — up from 26% in their late November polling.

Dan Schnur, a political communications and strategy expert who teaches at the University of Southern California, told ABC News that part of that comes from Republican voters, including working-class young men, feeling the impact of high costs.

“A lot of voters, particularly working-class young men, voted for him last year because they were angry about the inflation under Biden and they believed Trump would make things better,” he said. “That hasn’t happened yet, and so we’re beginning to see their disappointment.”

Ryan Mahoney, a Republican strategist and former communications director for the Georgia Republican Party, told ABC News he thinks this low approval may be because of a “disconnect from the White House to the American people, about the president acknowledging and empathizing with the cost crunch that the American people are feeling.”

Asked on Tuesday if he was worried about recent polling and whether affordability would be a political liability, Vance brushed off concerns — instead shifting blame to Biden.

“When we go out there and we tell our story, that gasoline and energy got way too high under Joe Biden’s administration, but we’ve lowered the cost of energy — the American people will understand that … They know what Joe Biden broke is not going to be fixed in a week,” Vance said. 

ABC News has reached out to Biden’s office for comment on Vance’s remarks.

Inflation rose during Biden’s term (while slowing toward its end). At the time, Biden and his White House defended the administration’s performance on the economy by pointing to measures they took to bolster the economy, particularly as it struggled in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic.

Economists have also said rising prices during Biden’s presidency did not occur in a vacuum, but emerged in part from factors such as the supply shortage imposed by the pandemic.

Despite the economic woes during the COVID-19 pandemic, the U.S. economy significantly outperformed other major industrialized nations as it emerged from the pandemic, according to an October 2024 report by the Brookings Institution.

Schnur said that while discussing Biden could be “part of, potentially, an effective message. The problem is that blaming your predecessor — for any president — has diminishing returns the longer they’ve been in office.”

From a tactical perspective, Mahoney said, “It’s OK to blame what happened for the four years before you got into office, that you’re having to wade through that … I think all of that is fair game,” Mahoney said. “I do think, though, you have to then present what your plan is.”

Trump is set to once again speak about the economy in Rocky Mount, North Carolina, Friday — so will his administration’s focus on the issue and travels help Americans feel better about how they’re handling the economy? 

“I love the idea of getting on the road … but at the end of the day, the script, the teleprompter, the remarks to folks, the interviews with press, have to acknowledge the problem and then provide the solutions,” Mahoney said.

Doug Heye, another GOP strategist and a former spokesperson for the Republican National Committee, told ABC News, “In a normal political world, this is what you do, and this helps. But we just saw in Pennsylvania, where Trump was supposed to talk about the economy, and brings up all this other stuff, and all he does is get in the way of himself, and there’s no reason to think that that’s going to change.”

Schnur, meanwhile, cautioned that local visits may help Trump’s standing on the economy with older voters, but may have less impact on younger voters who get their news more through digital platforms — a challenge facing both major political parties.

David McIntosh, the president of the conservative political group Club for Growth, said Republicans should “take their message directly to the people this Christmas and in 2026” and explain that the way to reduce prices is “to have price transparency, reduce regulations, and allow free markets to bring back affordability.”

A White House spokesperson, in response to the recent polling and concerns raised by some in the GOP, pointed to how Trump was elected because of economic concerns and to Thursday’s better-than-expected inflation numbers as a sign of the administration’s success.

“President Trump was resoundingly re-elected one year ago precisely because he, unlike Democrats, understood and acknowledged Joe Biden’s economic disaster,” White House spokesman Kush Desai said in a statement to ABC News.

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(WASHINGTON) — President Donald Trump on Tuesday touted the arrival of his border czar, Tom Homan, on a mission to Minneapolis — as he took personal charge of dealing with the backlash following the second fatal shooting of an American citizen by federal agents in the city.

The president, who had said Homan would report directly to him, sounded positive about his change in course so far, saying Homan had met with Minnesota Democratic Gov. Tim Walz and would do the same with Minneapolis Democratic Mayor Jacob Frey.

“I hear things are going very nicely,” Trump told reporters as he left the White House for Iowa, where he was set to deliver remarks on the economy. But there has been no apparent immediate change or pullback in the deployment of federal immigration enforcement agents — as Walz and Frey have demanded.

The White House has noticeably sought to put some distance between the president and the controversial words of his top officials in the immediate aftermath of the deadly shooting of Alex Pretti, a 37-year-old ICU nurse.

Trump on Sunday declined to defend the agents involved, and White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt on Monday said she hadn’t heard Trump characterize Pretti the same way as White House deputy chief of staff Stephen Miller or Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem — both of whom had quickly accused him of domestic terrorism without any evidence.

Trump on Tuesday also publicly broke with Miller, telling reporters he does not believe Pretti was an “assassin” as Miller had described him.

When asked if he believes Pretti’s death was justified, Trump said a “big investigation” is underway and suggested he would be monitoring it personally.

“I want to see the investigation. I’m going to be watching over it. I want a very honorable and honest investigation. I have to see it myself,” Trump said.

At the same time, Trump continued to criticize Pretti for having a gun on him, which state and local officials said he was lawfully carrying with a concealed carry permit, telling reporters: “You can’t walk in with guns.”

On what his message is for Pretti’s family, Trump told ABC News Chief White House Correspondent Mary Bruce: “Well, I’m looking at that whole situation. I love everybody. I love all of our people. I love his family. And it’s a very sad situation.”

Still, Trump stood by Noem on Tuesday and told reporters she won’t be stepping down.

“I think she’s done a very good job. The border is totally secure,” Trump said.

Noem met with Trump in the Oval Office on Monday as scrutiny grew over the shooting and the administration’s response, sources told ABC News. While sources said Noem is expected to keep her job as of now, her focus is expected to shift to other priorities.

A person familiar with the planning said Homan is likely to focus on more targeted immigration enforcement efforts. 

Homan’s arrival also comes as Customs and Border Protection commander-at-large Greg Bovino is set to leave Minneapolis to return to El Centro, California, and resume his duties as chief of that sector, multiple sources told ABC News. Some Border Patrol agents are also leaving Minneapolis.

Earlier Tuesday, in a radio interview on “Sid & Friends In the Morning,” Trump said that if Minneapolis officials give the federal government “their criminals” then it “all goes away” when asked about the possibility of some federal forces leaving the state.

“What we need is their criminals. You know, they have criminals. And all I said, ‘just give us your criminals’ and if you give us the criminals, it all goes away,” the president said.

Trump also recounted calls he had with both Walz and Frey on Monday amid growing tensions in Minneapolis.

“Actually, they were both great conversations,” Trump said. “So, let’s hope that turns out to be so.”

Walz, who was critical of the Trump administration’s immigration crackdown in an op-ed on Monday, said he and Homan agreed to an “open dialogue” after their meeting on Tuesday.

“Governor Walz met with Tom Homan this morning and reiterated Minnesota’s priorities: impartial investigations into the Minneapolis shootings involving federal agents, a swift, significant reduction in the number of federal forces in Minnesota, and an end to the campaign of retribution against Minnesota,” Walz’s office said in a statement.

“The Governor and Homan agreed on the need for an ongoing dialogue and will continue working toward those goals, which the President also agreed to yesterday. The Governor tasked the Minnesota Department of Public Safety as the primary liaison to Homan to ensure these goals are met,” the statement read.

Frey called his meeting with Homan “productive” in a series of posts on X.

“I reiterated that my main ask is for Operation Metro Surge to end as quickly as possible. Public safety works best when it’s built on community trust, not tactics that create fear or division,” he said.

Frey added he made it clear to Homan that “Minneapolis does not and will not enforce federal immigration laws.” 

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