‘Why are you saying it like that?’ CNN anchor surprised by ex-Trump aide’s speech analysis

CNN’s Audie Cornish expressed surprise at a former White House official’s analysis of President Donald Trump’s economic address from the White House.

The president delivered a roughly 20-minute address Wednesday night from the Diplomatic Reception Room blaming current economic troubles on former President Joe Biden and insisting the economy was improving, and one of Trump’s former White House communications directors told “CNN This Morning” the speech fell short of the mark.

“It felt more like a marathon shoved into a sprint,” said Mike Dubke, who served under Trump in early 2017. “From my point of view, it was a mini State of the Union, about a month or a month and a half before he’s going to deliver his real State of the the Union. I thought this was going to be an economic speech. I thought that this was going to be kind of a restart on the economic messaging – that’s what I was hoping for.”

Cornish said that seemed to be the intent, but she pressed Dubke to explain what he meant.

“Why are you saying it like that?” Cornish said.

“Well, because it really was a replay of all of the campaign issues from 2024,” Dubke explained, “and while I think there are a lot, especially on the border, a lot of victories that President Trump can can claim, the American people are looking forward, not backwards, and I – and if I had to be critical of the speech, I think that would be my main criticism that it was looking backwards towards these victories rather than forwards towards what the tariffs are going to mean for, say, lower-income individuals.”

“Maybe it will lower your taxes, he should have spoken, in my opinion – more on no taxes on tips and overtime, what came forward in the, I guess we’re calling it the Working Families Tax Act,” Dubke added, referring to the law more commonly known as the One Big Beautiful Bill Act. “There is a lot of good that was in that bill that will come to fruition in 2026, and that’s where I would have really pressed.”

Cornish asked how that message was different from what Biden’s team said to reassure Americans about the economy.

“That’s not what the Biden people said,” Dubke said. “They said, you don’t realize, you don’t realize how good you have it now.”

Fellow panelist Meghan Hays was part of Biden’s communications team during the first two years of his term, and she commented on the differences between the former president’s message and Trump’s address.

“First of all, that speech did not rise to the level of a prime-time address from the White House, and I’m surprised the networks took it,” Hays said. “There’s a level set there that is not something that needed to be addressed in prime time. It was one of his rambling, screaming remarks that said nothing. We’re still unemployment is the highest it’s been since 2022. Inflation is exactly where it was when he took office, and continuing to blame the past, to your point, is not working.”

“People still are not feeling any relief, and there’s no solutions, and then to top it off, Congress is leaving today without doing anything about the health care subsidies,” Hays added. “So he’s saying one thing, Congress is not doing anything to be helpful to him to even drive a message if they wanted to, and the American people are the ones still suffering while getting yelled at by the president.”