Trump Hasn’t Kept His Biggest Campaign Promise One Year Since His Election

WASHINGTON ― At his final rally of the 2024 presidential election, Donald Trump reiterated a key promise to voters that he would personally bring down the soaring prices and high cost of living that had dogged the administration of his Democratic opponent, former Vice President Kamala Harris and her boss, former President Joe Biden.

“The workers are getting destroyed. Her inflation disaster has made life unaffordable and cost families over $30,000,” Trump told voters last November in Grand Rapids, Michigan, a battleground state he flipped back into the Republican column. “Under my leadership, we are quickly going to turn this economic nightmare into an economic miracle. We will make America wealthy again, and we will make America affordable again.”

One year after his major victory, Trump is struggling to deliver on that promise, which was a significant reason why he beat Harris in the first place. Although gasoline prices have declined and mortgage rates have ticked down, other costs, including groceries, have skyrocketed. The price of beef, coffee and bananas have reached record highs. The latest data from the government actually shows inflation increasing as Trump’s global tariffs wreak havoc on U.S. consumers and his administration cracks down on immigrants. 

Another big promise Trump made last year was that he would bring down the cost of energy, but the price of electricity has spiked across the country, putting even more of a squeeze on Americans struggling with the high cost of living. 

Voters aren’t happy with Trump’s handling of the economy, and they don’t think he’s focused on fixing it. According to the latest Washington Post-ABC poll, 59% of Americans give Trump either a great deal or a good amount of blame for the current rate of inflation, and the approval of Trump’s handling of the economy stands at 37% vs. 62% who disapprove. Those findings were backed up by an NBC News poll conducted in October, which found that 65% of Americans believe Trump has fallen short of looking out for the middle class, and 66% expressed the same sentiment for the handling of inflation and the cost of living.

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Overall, Trump is the most unpopular he’s been this term. His disapproval hasn’t hit this level since January 2021, after the insurrection at the U.S. Capitol. 

Trump’s Democratic critics give the president poor marks, hammering him for failing to bring down costs and using the same playbook he used against them in the last election. 

“Auto loans are the highest delinquency ever,” Sen. Ruben Gallego (D-Ariz.), a potential 2028 Democratic presidential contender, noted in an interview with HuffPost. “The price of food is still high. The price of turkey is almost doubled – I don’t know if you started looking into your Thanksgiving budget yet.  Electricity is high. And of course, we’re about to get huge health insurance premiums for 24 million Americans.”

“So I would say on that, if there’s anything less than an F-minus, I would give them an F-minus,” he added. 

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Republicans remain broadly supportive of Trump, but there are signs that they are getting more comfortable defying him, particularly on economic issues. Last week, a handful of Senate Republicans voted to rebuke Trump over his tariffs, and Vice President JD Vance also got an earful from GOP senators outraged by the administration importing Argentine beef to the detriment of U.S. cattle ranchers. 

“I think the best way to make sure that those beef prices stabilize and start to come down is to make sure that American producers know that there’s going to be a market there, and they’re not going to have their legs cut out from underneath them by an infusion of foreign beef into the market,” Sen. Mike Rounds (R-S.D.) told HuffPost.

Other Republican senators said the impact of Trump’s tariffs were beginning to hit close to home, especially during this holiday season. 

“I had a family member order a Halloween costume for one of their children and it was going to be about $50, and they ended up having to pay a $27 tariff,” Sen. Thom Tillis (R-N.C.) said. “And then I got into thinking about that. There will be the measure of inflation, and then there will be the perception of how much more expensive Christmas presents are this year. Those will be the kind of things we start watching in the fourth quarter.”

Trump’s failure to fully extend food assistance for over 42 million Americans over the weekend amid the ongoing government shutdown, as well as the sticker shock of skyrocketing health insurance premiums for millions more Americans will only add to the pile of Trump’s domestic problems ahead of next year’s 2026 midterm elections. But when asked during an interview with CBS’ “60 Minutes” what his message is to people struggling from the high cost of living, Trump dodged by talking instead about crime and immigration ― two issues where voters give him better marks. 

“Well, let me just say, cashless bail is a disaster. It’s gotta be changed,” Trump said in response. “Sanctuary cities really have to be changed. One of the things I’ve focused on is making Chicago great again.”

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Elsewhere on the economy, Trump did deliver on his vow to cut taxes. He signed his Big Beautiful Bill into law that extended his 2017 tax cuts for the mostly wealthy to the tune of nearly $4 trillion. The legislation contained deductions for taxes on tips and overtime, two Trump promises that helped him win over many blue collar workers last year. However, those provisions are temporary and sunset after 2028, whereas the tax cuts are permanent. 

On the issue of health care, Trump has yet to reveal his own plan to lower health costs, as he repeatedly promised while attacking Obamacare during the campaign trail. He also hasn’t followed through on his pledge to make in vitro fertilization free for American families after calling himself “the father of IVF” last year. Instead, Trump cut Medicaid to the tune of $800 billion to help pay for his tax cuts for the wealthy. He’s also now refusing to extend enhanced subsidies for people enrolled in the Affordable Care Act, which Democrats have demanded as a condition to agree to fund the government.

Trump has been far more occupied with exacting revenge against his perceived enemies. After vowing he would end the “weaponization” of government in response to his impeachment and federal indictment following the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the U.S. Capitol, Trump instead directed the Department of Justice to go after his Democratic opponents, including former FBI Director James Comey, former national security director John Bolton, New York Attorney General Letitia James and Sen. Adam Schiff (D-Calif.). 

Trump’s administration is preparing sweeping changes at the Internal Revenue Service that would allow the agency to pursue criminal inquiries into liberal groups, the very thing he and other conservatives once complained about under former President Barack Obama’s administration. Under Trump, the Federal Communications Commission has launched investigations into nearly all major broadcast networks and threatened broadcaster licenses over political speech ― all despite Trump’s frequent complaints about “cancel culture” and censorship. 

“We’ve seen probably a little bit more intensity,” Tillis, who serves on the Senate Judiciary Committee, acknowledged when asked about Trump’s quest for retribution. “I won’t use the word ‘weaponizing,’ but I think it’s really pushing the envelope. And what I worry about are the political physics. We can just assume that’s going to happen in the next Democrat administration.”

One area where Trump has kept his promises is on immigration. His administration has succeeded in stopping the flow of migrants on the U.S.-Mexico border, and it has carried out mass immigration raids across the country, even deploying National Guard troops to major cities to do so. But rather than focusing on immigrants with criminal records, as he repeatedly promised on the campaign trail, Trump’s administration is deporting many people without criminal records who have been in the U.S. for decades. It has also alarmingly swept up many U.S. citizens in its nationwide crackdown. 

On the foreign policy front, Trump has had a mixed record. He failed to immediately end the war in Ukraine, as he repeatedly promised on the campaign trail. After meeting with Russian President Vladimir Putin in Alaska earlier this year, a meeting that yielded no results, he’s dragged his feet on issuing tough sanctions on Russia and seems to have largely given up hope on resolving the conflict. In the Middle East, he helped negotiate a deal that released Israeli hostages held by Hamas. His quest for peace ― and a Nobel Peace Prize ― has yet to be realized, however. 

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But for fans of Trump, there’s been a lot to love.

“Anybody in their right mind that’s got logic and reason and absolutely got the perspective to really look fairly would have to say that President Trump has done an unbelievable job,” said Sen. Jim Justice (R-W.Va.), who was also elected last year. “So many wins. It’s off the chart, you know?”

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