Issues & Insights
Dems' inflation scenario for Trump is not panning out. Source: Rawpixel, licensed under CC0 1.0 (Public Domain).

Hey, About That Not-So-‘Surprising’ Drop In Inflation …

No doubt you’ve already heard the news that inflation actually declined in March on a month-to-month basis for the first time in almost three years, and fell to 2.4% on a yearly basis. This is horrible news, at least for the Democratic Party, which continues to hope for the worst under President Donald Trump.

Economists had actually expected inflation to rise for the month. Instead, this is the first time since July 2022 that the index declined. “Surprising,” said a number of headlines.

Recall for a moment last year’s bold promise from Trump on inflation: “Prices will come down and come down dramatically and come down fast,” he said.

So far, so good, as Trump himself noted on X.

Despite Trump’s imposition of tariffs on much of the rest of the world, in particular China, which he had promised to do, his moves so far have had zero impact on inflation and are unlikely to for months to come.

Democrats are in a tough spot. Unable to tar Trump with President Joe Biden’s inflation disaster, Democrats earlier found what they believed was a point of inflation vulnerability for Trump: The soaring cost of eggs!

They complained vociferously about egg prices during the opening days of Trump’s second term, as if his policies had caused the problem. Yet, strangely, Dems and their leftist allies in the media had barely even mentioned the topic until Trump got in office.

Indeed, from 2021 to 2024, egg prices rose on average 13.3% a year as Biden ordered more than 100 million egg-laying hens to be destroyed, leaving store shelves short of eggs. Prices inevitably soared.

Whether one likes Trump or not, he had nothing to do with the high prices for eggs, or anything else for that matter. It was all on Biden’s tab.

Yet on Jan. 28, CNN ran this headline, just days after Trump took office: “Trump pledged to bring down food prices on Day One. Instead, eggs are getting more expensive.”

Uh, not actually. According to Trading Economics, egg prices have plunged 45% since the start of this year. And, as hen flock populations are restored and more eggs are produced, prices will fall further.

This happened, by the way, despite the fact that world-renowned egg expert and “The View” co-host Whoopi Goldberg claimed: “[Trump] did promise to lower the price of groceries, I have not seen an egg fall one cent since this man got in.”

As Breitbart Business reported, her colleague, Sunny Hostin doubled down on Goldberg’s cluelessness, by claiming prices for eggs are going up.

Par for the course for the leftist “mainstream” media complex.

This isn’t the first time Trump has been blamed for problems that he didn’t cause. In his first term, lasting from January 2017 to January of 2021, he was bedeviled by claims that his tariffs (yes, he imposed tariffs then, too) and tax cuts would lead to higher inflation. They didn’t.

Even so, less than a month after Trump was elected, the Federal Reserve embarked on an aggressive series of rate hikes, eight in all, even though inflation remained below the Fed’s target of 2%.

Why? Then-Fed Chairman Janet Yellen, at the time, said some Fed board members had “penciled in” Trump’s unorthodox fiscal policy plans as a reason for tightening up interest rates further.

Things were different when Yellen was Biden’s treasury secretary. If she had misgivings as Biden and the Democratic Congress went on an unprecedented $6 trillion “stimulus” spending binge, after shutting the economy down almost entirely for months, we didn’t hear it.

And the Fed, by then headed by Jerome Powell, helped fuel the inflation by holding rates down even as inflation roared and by creating hundreds of billions of dollars of new money out of thin air to aid the stimulus.

The result: a 9% spurt in annual inflation, along with our current inflation problem – a problem that Trump inherited.

Since 1999, the U.S. cost of living has risen by more than 20%, causing a major erosion in average working Americans’ standard of living. It’s a big reason why Trump won again in 2024.

And it’s all because of a massive overreaction by Biden and the Democratic-led Congress, which used an over-hyped COVID outbreak as an excuse to put the entire economy under Washington’s control.

Right now, Trump’s plans to drill for more oil, to use coal when necessary, to massively deregulate the U.S. economy, and to use DOGE to ferret out trillions in government waste, fraud and abuse, are all things that will help further contain inflation.

We’re no fans of tariffs, but who knows? If Trump gets our trade partners to lower their tariffs on our goods and to invest up to $5 trillion more here in the U.S., as Trump believes, we’ll have millions of new jobs and growing incomes. And then there’ll be cheap eggs for everyone.

— Written by the I&I Editorial Board

I & I Editorial Board

The Issues and Insights Editorial Board has decades of experience in journalism, commentary and public policy.

3 comments

  • The democrat traitor’s lies didn’t, and don’t, work, so now they are resorting to advocating violence, assassination of Trump and Musk, and Republicans in general. This is going to get ugly.

  • In my opinion so far we are very, very fortunate to have President Trump as our President. I believe, because of Trump’s tariff policy and his unleashing energy and reducing regulations, that not only will he jump start the economy and we will not anymore be screwed in our trade with other nations, he will also build up our military might and defense (as past President’s since Reagan didn’t) and build up our once vaunted (see WWII) manufacturing base.
    If it weren’t for the Constitutional Amendment of 1947, I believe that’s the year it was passed, which limits a President to two terms, I’d support and promote a third term Trump.
    Hmmm…. However, on rethinking it: Was this Constitutional Amendment even Constitutional. It is the Federal legislature limiting the Executive’s Power.
    I don’t think the Article 1 power of the legislature can limit a 3rd term for the chief executive. Otherwise the legislature could put limits on the Supreme Court and its rulings.
    But the Articles of the Constitution provides for a Supreme Court-the way it provides for an Executive. The legislature can tamp down executive power because it is in charge of the purse-strings-but other than that it is implicitly restrained.
    This is made more clear in the imprimatur of the Constitution which is based on “government by the people.” If the 1947 Amendment is allowed, then the people can’t vote for the President they want. In effect the Legislature does (by choosing who can’t run for President).
    The Supreme Court hasn’t directly addressed this issue. I think it is about time it did. Perhaps the ruling will come out just about the time Trump starts campaigning for his third term.

    • The 22nd Amendment is in stone. Only a repeal which would take years.

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