"It's the economy, stupid." That was the Democrats' famous tagline from the 1992 presidential campaign, and it may hold true for 2026 if the latest polls are any indication. A new Fox News poll finds three quarters of voters (76%) have a negative view of the economy, and nearly two-thirds (62%) blame the Trump administration over the Biden administration.
The Trump White House has made notable progress on inflation from the Biden years, but it remains higher than it was in Trump's first term. "The overall inflation rate is right at three percent, which is certainly not where we were in the Biden administration, where you had a more than 20 percent increase in prices over the four years of Joe Biden," says Jeff Crouere, host and political analyst. "So yeah, they've got a story to tell, but they've got to get it out there."
President Trump seems to be trying to get that story out there. This week, he told an economic summit that "affordable is our word." The White House is echoing that theme, as well. Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt told reporters, "We know that Americans are still hurting from the four-decade high inflation caused by Joe Biden and the Democrats, but President Trump is making significant progress to fix this, and he will not stop working until he solves it."
Then there are other economic factors that are out of the president's hands, like interest rates. Crouere says the Federal Reserve has done Trump no favors by holding rates high. "We need to see more interest rate reductions, because a big problem is we don't have enough people able to buy houses because of high mortgage rates," he tells KTRH. "When President Trump left office in 2021, the average interest rate was 2.75%, today it's more than double that."
"People vote economic issues, it has been that way for decades," he continues. "I think the White House is keenly aware that the midterms are only a year away, and that is going to be the primary issue."
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