The Promise that Trump Will Come to Deeply Regret

Trump was elected to lower prices, he has no plan to do so

Donald Trump’s low-energy inaugural address was filled with promises. Many were vague (“The golden age of America begins right now."); others were weirdly messianic (“I was saved by God to make America great again.”); many were specific promises made on the campaign trail (“I will declare a national emergency at our southern border”). Within hours of taking the oath of office, Trump began fulfilling several of those promises. He also fulfilled one significant campaign promise strategically unnamed during the speech — pardoning 1,600 January 6th rioters.

But among all of the promises Trump made on his first day in office, there is one he may come to regret more than any other:

I will direct all members of my cabinet to marshal the vast powers at their disposal to defeat what was record inflation and rapidly bring down costs and prices.

Here’s why:

High Prices Are Why Trump was Elected.

No single issue wins or loses an election, but polling and focus groups can help us understand the overriding reasons for a particular outcome. The data from 2024 is crystal clear about why Trump won. People were very unhappy with the economy because the prices of gas, groceries and housing were too high. They trusted Trump more to improve the economy. A post-election survey from Navigator Research showed that inflation and the cost of living was the top issue in the election by far.

Looking at the list of issues in the above chart, high prices were the dominant factor in the election. The voters who switched from Biden to Trump and the folks who voted for Trump the first time are even more focused on high prices than the electorate at large. Put another way, Trump won despite, not because of, his topics during his inaugural address and what he did during his first few days in office.