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Inside Trump’s ‘Golden Age’: Troubling New Trends Emerge

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This is “the golden age of America, because we are doing better than we’ve ever done as a country,” President Donald Trump declared last month, standing before a backdrop emblazoned with “The Golden Age,” as he promoted a central theme of his administration.

On the White House’s social media page on X it declares, “The Golden Age of America Begins Right Now.”

The Golden Age of American business has arrived,” the White House also said in October.

“This is indeed the Golden Age of America,” President Trump told the United Nations General Assembly in September.

But the economic numbers paint a more complicated picture.

READ MORE: Speaker Johnson Insists ‘Best Days Ahead’ as GOP Infighting Boils Into Open Revolt

Inflation is persistent, most recently at 3%, and has generally trended upward every month since April when Trump announced his tariff program. This, despite the president promising there is “virtually no inflation,” and having campaigned on ending inflation “on day one.”

Consumer sentiment has fallen to a near record low, Bloomberg News reported last month, noting that views of personal finances are “the dimmest since 2009, and consumers remain frustrated about high prices and weakening incomes.”

“Consumers are anxious about the high cost of living and job security, with the probability of personal job loss climbing to the highest since July 2020,” Bloomberg added.

On Thursday, those fears were supported by a new report from consulting firm Challenger, Gray & Christmas, that found layoffs this year have topped 1.1 million — the highest since, coincidentally, 2020, when Trump was also president.

“It’s only the sixth time since 1993 that announced job cuts through the month of November have surpassed 1.1 million,” NBC News reported on Thursday.

U.S.-based employers announced 71,321 job cuts just in November, Challenger reported. NBC noted it is “the highest total for the month of November since 2022.”

“Tariffs,” CNBC added, “were cited as the driver of more than 2,000 cuts in November and nearly 8,000 year to date.”

READ MORE: Trump Urges Judge Aileen Cannon to Keep Jack Smith Report Secret

Some experts are now talking about “stagflation.”

“We’re seeing the early stages of what economists call ‘stagflation’ —  the ‘flation’ part is inflation, and you’ve all felt that at the grocery store,” economist Justin Wolfers explained last month. “The ‘stag’ part is stagnation, which is, we’ve got rising unemployment and slower economic growth than we otherwise would have.”

And in October, Moody’s Analytics Chief Economist Mark Zandi said 22 U.S. states are already in a recession, Moneywise reported.

Meanwhile, millions of Americans this month are seeing their health care premiums for next year jump sharply — with some plans reported to be doubling or even tripling. And President Trump last month predicted that tariff payments will soon “skyrocket.”

“Foreclosures are surging,” CBS News reported last month, “as U.S. homeowners grapple with rising costs.” So are auto repossessions.

ABC News in November reported that “Americans’ household debt levels – including mortgages, car loans, credit cards and student loans – are now at a new record high.”

READ MORE: Student’s Bible-Based Essay Grade Leads University to Put Instructor on Leave

 

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Trump Blasted Federal Prosecutors as ‘Weak’ for Not Targeting His Adversaries: Report

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President Donald Trump last week reportedly blasted a group of dozens of U.S. Attorneys for what he viewed as a lack of urgency in pursuing his political adversaries.

The federal prosecutors had traveled to the White House for a photo shoot, The Wall Street Journal reported on Tuesday, but after Attorney General Pam Bondi introduced them to the president, “Trump criticized them as ineffective, saying the group was making it difficult for Bondi and Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche to do their jobs.”

The exchange between Trump and the U.S. Attorneys “came a day before federal prosecutors sent grand jury subpoenas to the Federal Reserve on Friday, related to Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell’s testimony last summer about the central bank’s building-renovation project.”

READ MORE: Trump Declares Grocery Prices ‘Rapidly Down’ as Cost of Food Surges to 3-Year High

Jeanine Pirro, the U.S. Attorney for the District of Columbia, was in attendance at the White House event, the Journal reported. The subpoenas reportedly were sought by prosecutors in her office.

One of Trump’s complaints to the U.S. Attorneys was that they were not acting fast enough and had yet to bring a case against U.S. Senator Adam Schiff (D-CA), a top Trump adversary.

The DOJ reportedly has been examining whether Schiff engaged in mortgage fraud, which has become a common allegation against other Trump critics, including New York Attorney General Letitia James. That case was dismissed, and subsequent grand juries have refused to indict her.

“The president criticized some specific prosecutors by jurisdiction and said he felt betrayed,” the Journal added.

On Monday, Pirro appeared to be quickly backtracking in her office’s investigation of Powell. The Federal Reserve Chairman announced on Sunday that he was being investigated by the Trump Department of Justice, sending markets — and prominent Republicans — spinning.

The Daily Beast reported that Pirro’s investigation is “an inquiry that even Republican lawmakers have blasted as a revenge plot against one of the president’s adversaries that threatens the independence of America’s central bank.”

READ MORE: Warning Signs Flash for GOP as CNN Analyst Predicts House Flip

 

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Trump Declares Grocery Prices ‘Rapidly Down’ as Cost of Food Surges to 3-Year High

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The price of food in grocery stores and restaurants surged to a three-year high last month, even as President Donald Trump on Tuesday insisted he had “defeated” inflation during what he described as “the greatest first year in history” of any president.

“Grocery prices are starting to go rapidly down,” Trump told an audience in Detroit on Tuesday. CNN’s Daniel Dale noted Trump made the claim “on the same day new Consumer Price Index data shows December had the biggest one-month spike in grocery prices, 0.7%, in more than three years.”

Despite the president’s claims, Axios reported that the cost of food in grocery stores rose “roughly 2.4% in December compared to the prior year.”

READ MORE: Warning Signs Flash for GOP as CNN Analyst Predicts House Flip

“But that masks double-digit price increases for a slew of household staples over the past 12 months, including coffee (+20%), beef (+16%) and candy (+10%).”

Delivering his speech on affordability — which as recently as last month he declared a “hoax” — Trump said on Tuesday, “Under our administration, growth is exploding, productivity is soaring, investment is booming, incomes are rising, inflation is defeated, America is respected again, like never before.”

On tariffs, which experts say could increase prices for American families by nearly $5,000 annually and push nearly one million Americans into poverty, Trump pushed back.

“The evidence shows overwhelmingly that the tariffs are not paid by American consumers,” he said, a claim not supported by experts.

The White House on Monday said that Trump has been “laser-focused on making America affordable” since taking office. Just one month ago, President Trump called affordability a “hoax” perpetrated by Democrats.

READ MORE: ‘Organized Gangs of Wine Moms’ Are Impeding Federal Agents Says Fox Columnist

 

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Warning Signs Flash for GOP as CNN Analyst Predicts House Flip

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As Republicans continue their exodus from the House, a CNN analyst reveals that Democrats hold an advantage in party identification over the GOP, Democrats identifying as liberal just hit a 50-year high, and Democrats — he predicts — will take back the House in the November midterm elections.

CNN analyst Harry Enten reported that “the self identified liberalness of this country is at a 50-year high.” And he noted that “more folks are identifying as liberal than at any point since the Gerald Ford administration.”

In 1976, 30 percent of Democrats said they were liberal, Enten said.

“Look at where we are today: 59 percent — 3 in 5 Democrats — say they are liberal.”

READ MORE: Trump ‘Laser-Focused’ on Affordability Says White House After Calling It a ‘Hoax’

“This Democratic party is a liberal — it is a liberal party. Fifty-nine percent of Democrats now identify as liberal,” he continued. “That is also a 50-year high.”

Enten noted that “that is not the only good news for liberals.”

“The party ID margin, Democrats versus Republicans. Now get this, in the latest reading according to Gallup last quarter, it is an eight-point advantage for Democrats.”

“That looks nothing like what we saw going into the 2022 midterms when Republicans had a five-point advantage, and of course, took back the House. This is even better than what we saw Democrats had back in 2017, in quarter four, when they had a six-point advantage, and, of course, Democrats easily took back the House then.”

READ MORE: Pirro Backtracks as Powell Investigation Rapidly Goes Off the Rails

“Democrats are gonna take back the House,” he said.

Enten also pointed to the prediction markets, which now say there is a 77 percent chance of Democrats taking back the House in November.

READ MORE: ‘Organized Gangs of Wine Moms’ Are Impeding Federal Agents Says Fox Columnist

 

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