Donald Trump’s top economic adviser hinted that the president has no reason to suspect that the economy is anything less than perfect.
National Economic Council director Kevin Hassett was questioned on CBS’ Face the Nation Sunday why Trump believes that “prices are coming down tremendously,” as he claimed at a rally in Pennsylvania.
Hassett told anchor Margaret Brennan that the president only focuses on things “we have already made progress on.”
“So people are holiday shopping. They are aware of prices,“ Brennan replied.
Brennan noted that the consumer price index is up 3 percent year over year, while the personal consumption index has risen 2.8 percent.
“What data is he looking at? What’s your benchmark?” Brennnan continued.
Hassett responded: “One of the things that if you saw his presentation in Pennsylvania, is he put up a bunch of charts—which he loves to do—where he went through the individual items that have—we’ve already sort of made a bunch of progress on.”
Hassett then gave some examples of the successes that Trump seemingly uses as the basis of his sweeping economic claims.
“For example, under Joe Biden prescription drugs were up 9 percent. So far this year they are down six-tenths of a percent. Gasoline is way down. It was, like, the highest ever under Biden. He was talking about eggs.”
Many CBS viewers took his words as an admission that the president is only presented with what he wants to see.
Attorney Ron Filipkowski, who switched from the Republican party to the Democrats following the Jan. 6 capitol riots, wrote on X: “A familiar pattern.
“Trump’s sycophants only cherry-pick positive news to show him because they are afraid to show him the truth, providing rocket fuel to his natural predisposition to lie about everything.”
“Prices are coming down tremendously if you only look at the prices that came down.”
— 𝕊𝕦𝕟𝕕𝕒𝕖_𝔾𝕦𝕣𝕝 (@SundaeDivine) December 14, 2025
The revelation comes after Trump spoke to journalist Dasha Burns for a Politico interview Tuesday morning, and was asked what “grade” he’d give himself for his handling of the economy. “A-plus-plus-plus-plus-plus,” he excitedly decided, before the host had even finished her question.
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