A former press secretary to President Joe Biden warned that President Donald Trump is repeating the communications mistake that doomed her old boss, and making it worse.
In a New York Times op-ed, former Biden spokesperson Karine Jean-Pierre admitted that the previous administration’s economic message “didn’t land,” despite strong job creation, rising wages and low unemployment.
“We believed that if we laid out the evidence clearly enough, people would see what we saw. They didn’t, and we didn’t adjust to meet them where they were,” she wrote. “It cost Mr. Biden and, eventually, Vice President Kamala Harris dearly. President Trump is now making a mistake even more damaging.”
She noted that inflation, the indicator that hurt Biden most, is higher now than when Trump returned to office, that the bond market has been roiled and that the Federal Reserve just raised interest rates.
Rather than acknowledge those concerns, Jean-Pierre argued that Trump has dismissed them. He has called “affordability” a “fake word” and said higher gas prices are “a very inexpensive price to pay” for his war aims.
“When leaders neglect lived experience, the message collapses,” Jean-Pierre wrote.
Jean-Pierre also made a candid admission about Biden’s age, saying her answers from the White House podium “at best… failed to put out the fire; at worst, they fueled it.”
She warned the Trump White House to expect “only more, not less, scrutiny when the president appears to drift off during meetings, is cagey about the results of his medical exams or goes on one of his erratic, late-night social media screeds.”
“His communications team should know by now that the prices at the pump and the self-checkout line are undefeated,” Jean-Pierre added.
She said Trump’s “direct, emotional, repetitive and unmediated” style fits today’s fragmented media environment, but that its power is fading.
“A decade ago, his bluster, so unlike traditional politicians, grabbed ears and eyeballs. Now even many of his fans can see that he’s frequently just seeking attention,” Jean-Pierre wrote. “Look at just about any poll and you get the sense that voters increasingly don’t trust him.”
“Once people believe their government is not speaking to their reality, it becomes incredibly difficult to earn that trust back,” she concluded. “I see it happening again now.”
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