President Donald Trump has spent years testing the boundaries of what politicians can say publicly.
During his first presidential campaign, he famously said that he could “stand in the middle of Fifth Avenue and shoot somebody” without losing supporters. It was an exaggeration. But captured something real about Trump’s political appeal — his willingness to say things publicly that most politicians wouldn’t dare.
Now, in his second term, Trump is once again testing the boundaries of what a president can say — by dismissing Americans’ concerns about rising prices of food, energy, travel, and other goods. He has repeatedly indicated that worries about inflation and household finances are secondary to broader goals, such as ending conflicts abroad.
Last month, it was “I don’t think about Americans’ financial situation.” Then, last week, he told reporters that “I love the inflation” after the Bureau of Labor Statistics released figures that showed prices had risen at the fastest rate in three years.
The comments have drawn criticism from supporters and opponents alike, baffled some Republicans, and delighted many Democrats looking toward the quickly approaching 2026 midterm elections. They’ve also raised a broader question about Trump’s second term: Free from the constraints of another campaign, is the president governing with voters and his party in mind, or with his historical legacy at the forefront? And what happens politically when a president appears willing to openly deprioritize concerns about inflation and affordability?
Shelby Talcott, who covers the White House for Semafor, has spent months talking with administration officials and Trump allies about the president’s economic messaging and his priorities in a second term. She recently joined Today, Explained co-host Noel King to discuss what Trump’s comments reveal about his governing style, his political calculations, and how those around him are responding.
Below is an excerpt of their conversation, edited for length and clarity. There’s much more in the full podcast, so listen to Today, Explained wherever you get podcasts, including Apple Podcasts, Pandora, and Spotify.
President Trump has been talking about the economy a lot lately. Some of what he said has gotten a lot of attention. What are the most attention-grabbing things?
He has repeatedly, pretty bluntly said that he effectively doesn’t care about it. He has made comments indicating that this is all short-term, that he doesn’t care about inflation. And so those comments — he, again, has said more than once, “I’m not focused on Americans’ economic situation when I’m negotiating with Iran. I don’t care about this inflation number” — have really stood out to people over the past few months.
My favorite was “love the inflation.” He had an opportunity to walk it back. He did not. He doubled down. What do we make of that — that he’s telling us, it is not a mistake?
I think it indicates a few things. First of all, when I’m talking to administration officials and people who’ve known the president for years, one of the things that continuously comes back around is this is all really said in the broader context of the Iran War.
That is something that the president cares deeply about, and he genuinely believes that he needs to continue moving forward with this, right? He has talked a lot over the past few years about Iran not being able to obtain a nuclear weapon. And so he’s coming at this economic argument from the perspective of, I have to defend the decisions I’ve made globally.
But a big part of it is also about the legacy of Donald Trump. That’s something that he has been acutely focused on. He is far less worried about the midterms. About the price of groceries — actually, I asked somebody who’s close to the White House several months ago, “Why isn’t he more focused on this stuff?”
And the answer I got was, when the president goes down in the history books, it’s not going to be for eggs being a dollar a carton. It’s going to be for reinvigorating Venezuela, for going into Iran and getting their nuclear [material]. And so when he talks about “I don’t think about voters’ economic situations when I’m negotiating with this Iran war,” it’s because he is always thinking about what he’s doing legacy-wise. He has to defend the Iran war. That’s part of his legacy. He has to defend the Venezuela situation. That’s part of his legacy. And so all of these answers are tied back into how he’s thinking about his history and how he’s going to be remembered.
It’s just the timing of when he’s saying this is really notable because, obviously, there are a lot of Americans who are really struggling right now.
I get what you’re saying about why he’s articulating them. But there’s part of you that thinks the president must know that now is not the time. However, let’s give him a little bit of grace. Is there something about the time that maybe we’re missing?
I don’t know that it messes with him because he’s not running again, right? This is his last term in office. And I think that is also an overarching theme of what we’re seeing, why he’s making certain decisions, is because he’s unleashed this time around. It is certainly going to impact the party. And you’re hearing from lawmakers who are concerned.
You’re even hearing from White House officials who are trying to sort of walk back what he said or say, well, he didn’t really mean it in this context. He meant it in the x, y, z context. And so there are administration officials who, when they hear the president say things like that, they just sit back and sigh heavily because it does not make their jobs any easier.
Who are these people? Who’s driving the economic messaging at the White House?
If we are being honest, the answer is the president.
There are advisers around him who are telling him what to do. You know, James Blair is one of the president’s closest confidantes. He has recently shifted over into a midterms role, but he is still very involved in the White House and is there often. [Chief of Staff] Susie Wiles has really urged the president over the past several months to focus more on the midterms. You’re hearing from the people around Trump who recognized that the midterms, even though it doesn’t directly impact Trump — he’s not on the ballot — it’s going to impact him.
If Republicans lose, it’s going to be a lot harder for the president to get anything passed. It’s already hard, and Republicans have the majority. It’s also going to impact him because they believe that Democrats, if they take back the majority, are going to try to push things forward against Trump, right? There are impeachment concerns, etc. And so you do hear from the people around Trump who care a lot about this topic and want him to be more focused in his messaging.
But ultimately, as with everything else, this is Trump’s show.
What are the Democrats thinking? Every time President Trump says something like, “I love the inflation,” what do we see on the other side of the aisle?
I mean, they’re giddy. They’re kicking their feet, right? This is something that even Republican operatives that I’ve talked to, when the president made the comment about loving inflation, they said, even if that’s not what he meant, that’s going to be clipped. You’re gonna see that in ads across America.
Democrats love this rhetoric because it is a way for them — just like Trump was able to do during the 2024 election, which was focused on the economy — to say, this person who is in office right now doesn’t care. He’s there. He’s not helping you.
That’s what Trump did in order to beat Biden and Kamala Harris. They’re doing that same thing now with the midterms based on the president’s comments. Now the question is, are they going to be able to be organized enough to make that an effective message?
Ten, 15 years ago, if you had an American president saying, “I love the inflation,” or I don’t care about Americans’ economic circumstances, you do feel like that would’ve been the end of that president’s term in office. There would’ve been people in the streets. The world has changed, the US has changed. But I wonder what you think the broader lesson might be here.
Do you think President Trump is changing the way that presidents talk about the economy, or voters are changing the way they respond to messaging about the economy and saying, “It doesn’t really matter what the president says, we feel what we feel”?
I think it’s a little bit of both. I definitely think, not just with the Trump administration, quite frankly, but over the past several years, there has been a shift with voters sort of dismissing the presidential argument for the state of the economy. We saw it during the Biden administration. We’re seeing it now during the Trump administration.
But I think part of that is because of how these presidents, like Trump, like Biden, are messaging. Their message is effectively, “Things are good. We know that you’re saying things are not good, but it’s short-term. Don’t worry about it. And actually, look at all of this other data over here that shows that you’re not doing as badly as you feel like you’re doing.”
Voters are looking at that and saying, “I’m going to the grocery store. I’m struggling to pay for my groceries. That’s not a real message.” They’re dismissing the presidential argument of it all. But I do think with Trump in particular, he has changed politics in the way that he is able to say things and get away with them, in a way that other presidents in the past have not. And I really think presidents in the future won’t be able to either. I think it is unique to him.
