US President Donald Trump will boast of his achievements in an address to the nation Wednesday as voters sour on his handling of the economy after nearly a year back in power.
Republican Trump is also expected to tease policies for 2026, following a blitz of hardline protectionist and nationalist policies at the start of his second term.
With next year’s US midterm elections looming, the 79-year-old faces mounting anger among Americans about the high cost of living.
Trump did not say what he would talk about in the primetime speech from the White House at 9pm, saying only on social media that “it has been a great year for our Country, and THE BEST IS YET TO COME!”
But the White House said it would focus on his “historic accomplishments” including tackling inflation, which Trump blames on his Democratic predecessor Joe Biden, and tackling immigration.
“It’s going to be a really good speech. I was just in the Oval Office with the President discussing it,” Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt told reporters outside the West Wing on Tuesday.
“He’s going to talk a lot about the accomplishments over the past 11 months, all that he’s done to bring our country back to greatness, and all he continues to plan to do to continue delivering for the American people over the next three years.”
Leavitt separately told Fox News that Trump would be “maybe teasing some policy that will be coming in the New Year as well.”
Billionaire Trump, the oldest elected president in US history, has boasted of a new “golden age” in America.
He recently rated the economy as “A++++” and rages against what he called an “affordability hoax” by rival Democrats.
– ‘Make America affordable again’ –
But US voters are increasingly angry about high prices of everything from gas to and groceries, which experts say are partly fueled by the tariffs he has slapped on trading partners.
According to a poll by the University of Chicago for The Associated Press, published last week, only 31 percent of Americans are satisfied with Trump’s economic policy.
He also faces criticism from within his Make America Great Again (MAGA) movement for focusing on peace deals in Ukraine and Gaza and on tensions with Venezuela instead of domestic issues.
Now there are signs that his team have started to realize the issue could hurt Republicans in next year’s midterm elections for the control of Congress.
Republicans lost heavily in elections in November for the mayor of New York and governorships in Virginia and New Jersey, while running them close in a previously safe area Tennessee.
The president is ramping up his domestic travel to push his economic message.
Last week in Pennsylvania he promised to “make America affordable again,” and on Friday he is due to give another campaign-style rally in North Carolina on Friday.
Vice President JD Vance — who is rapidly becoming Trump’s messenger on the issue as he eyes his own presidential run in 2028 — urged voters to show patience during a speech on Tuesday.
“They know Rome wasn’t built in a day,” Vance said in the key, blue-collar swing state of Pennsylvania on Tuesday. “They know what Joe Biden broke is not going to get fixed in a week.”
Trump’s chief of staff Susie Wiles said in a Vanity Fair article published Tuesday that his program would feature “more talks about the domestic economy and less about Saudi Arabia.”
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