Trump’s claims of ‘greatest economy’ under attack from GOP rivals

Some Republican presidential candidates say the blame for crippling inflation stretches back before “Bidenomics” to the Trump administration.

It is the latest line of attack by rivals of former President Donald Trump as the first nominating contests draw near. The former president holds a roughly 30 percentage point lead in most polls in early-voting states.

Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis said a line could be drawn directly from the Trump team’s pandemic decision-making to subsequent supply chain problems, job market swings and inflation numbers hitting a 40-year high.

“The first three years of the Trump administration, the economy was better than it has been, but that last year with COVID I think was mishandled dramatically,” Mr. DeSantis said in a recent CNN town hall. He labeled Mr. Trump’s support for the economic shutdown and massive stimulus “a huge mistake.”

“That set the foundation for the inflation that we see,” Mr. DeSantis said.

Nikki Haley, a former ambassador to the United Nations, also sees Mr. Trump’s fingerprints on inflation. She blames the stimulus spending for overheating the economy and making inflation worse than it needed to be.

“Everybody is paying a price for the fact our past president put us in a hole,” she said.

Former New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie says the cause of inflation is “Joe Biden and his spending and Donald Trump and his spending during his time in the White House.”

The Federal Reserve Bank of San Francisco estimated that fiscal moves attempting to ease the fallout of pandemic shutdowns may have raised inflation by about 3 percentage points by the end of 2021. The annual inflation rate hit a high of 9.1% in June 2022 and is now hovering slightly above 3%.

The Federal Reserve’s target rate for inflation is 2%.

Brian Riedl, a senior fellow at the Manhattan Institute specializing in economic policy, said the nation was bound to face some level of inflation from the COVID-19 pandemic but government actions worsened it.

He laid most of the blame on President Biden and the $1.9 trillion American Rescue Plan, which he signed in early 2021. When Mr. Trump left office in January 2021, the annual inflation rate was 1.4%.

“I think the inflation comes from the trillion-dollar policies that are circulating after the economy has already reopened, and so it’s only whatever spending was left in the system [from Trump policies] after people started going back to work in the second quarter of 2021 that you would really look at,” Mr. Riedl said.

He said that doesn’t excuse the $2.3 trillion in relief Mr. Trump signed into law in 2020 or the tariffs Mr. Trump slapped on trade.

The Trump campaign did not respond to a request for comment.

The Republican National Committee released a video ad on Tuesday placing the blame for inflation solely on Mr. Biden.

“This holiday season, Bidenomics has made everything from Christmas trees to gifts unaffordable for middle-class families,” said RNC Chair Ronna McDaniel. “While Americans struggle to stay afloat, we’re reminding them who the real Grinch is this Christmas: Joe Biden.”

Few would argue that inflation isn’t the Grinch this Christmas.

PNC Bank’s annual Christmas Price Index, which measures the cost of the dozen gifts outlined in the “Twelve Days of Christmas,” hit a record high of $46,729.86, jumping another 2.7% after a 10.5% increase last year.

On the campaign trail, Mr. Trump says he created the “greatest economy” in the nation’s history. He pins inflation on Mr. Biden, who says he inherited the mess from Mr. Trump.

Absent a major shake-up in the presidential primary contests, a rematch between Mr. Biden and Mr. Trump is likely in the general election.

Mark Zandi, chief economist at Moody’s Analytics, said the Trump and Biden policies “had little to nothing to do with it.”

“This is evident from the high inflation across the globe, and that inflation is now quickly receding with sub-4% unemployment as the economic fallout from those two massive supply shocks is increasingly in the rearview mirror,” Mr. Zandi said. “The uncomfortably high inflation experienced in 2021-2022 was largely due to the impact of the pandemic on global supply chains and the job market, and the impact of the Russian war in Ukraine on energy, food and other commodity prices.”

Whatever the case, Mr. DeSantis and Ms. Haley are warning voters in the Republican nomination race that Mr. Trump’s record on the economy and inflation is not as stellar as he claims.

Still, a Des Moines Register/NBC News/Mediacom poll released this month found that 68% of likely Iowa caucusgoers say Mr. Trump would “do the best job with the economy.”

Mr. Riedl said inflation is a ripe political subject because it is too complicated for voters to understand.

“Whether it is the other party’s politicians or corporate greed, it is easy to pin [inflation] on whoever your enemy already is,” Mr. Reidl said. “There is disagreement among economists, which gives just enough leeway for people to come up with any theory they wish that is convenient for them.”