Donald Trump's speech at a Ford auto factory in Detroit on Tuesday was panned on Wednesday morning as being demonstrative of why his administration’s approval ratings are in free fall, according to the panel on “Morning Joe.”
On Wednesday, the MS NOW co-hosts started with Trump’s altercation with a heckler at the plant that got an employee suspended after the president gave him the middle finger, before turning to the president’s claims that the economy is booming despite all evidence to the contrary.
According to co-host Willie Geist, one need not look any further than Trump’s easily disproved claims to see why the White House is under siege and Republicans are rightfully worried about the November midterms.
After watching a clip of the president speaking, co-host Joe Scarborough observed, “You know, the president said that prices were going down and said food prices were going down quickly. Well, the fact is that in December, the last month that was reported, food prices actually shot up at a faster rate than at any time in three years.”
He added, “The president also said that inflation is gone, inflation's not gone. Inflation's at about 2.7 percent for 2025. Inflation was around 2.7 percent and food prices were stubbornly high. So if you're out there and you're hearing somebody telling you food prices are going down, that's just not the case.”
“When health care, my god, health care is unaffordable for middle-class and even upper middle-class Americans, it's a disaster!” he exclaimed. “This affordability crisis. You know, to say that's a hoax when the very things that keep people alive are skyrocketing to where they're unaffordable, Willie. No, no, no, no, it's just a lie.”
“That speech in Detroit yesterday was Exhibit A in the struggle that Donald Trump personally is having, but also this administration is having with this issue, which is the data, the data you just laid it out,” co-host Geist replied. “And when he says gas is below $2 now –– the national average of gas is $2.80. And it's even more where he was yesterday in the state of Michigan.”
“He's trying to will fake numbers into being the truth, but it's not going to work,” he predicted. “So he's there to announce an affordability agenda while attacking the idea that affordability is a problem. He says it's a democrat hoax, that it's a fake story.”