By Breitbart News Network | Created at 2026-10-10 02:27:05 | Updated at 2026-10-10 07:03:58
7 hours ago
Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent fired back Friday at Sen. Elizabeth Warren’s new “Trumpflation” tracker, accusing the Massachusetts Democrat of cherry-picking economic data to obscure gains in Americans’ purchasing power under President Donald Trump.
“Another day, another Econ 101 lesson for Professor Warren,” Bessent said in a statement accompanying an administration affordability tracker comparing inflation, wages, and household income under Trump and former President Joe Biden.
Warren’s dashboard “conveniently ignores the Bidenflation tidal wave that crushed American families, cherry-picks wage growth by refusing to acknowledge positive real wage gains since President Trump came into office, and swaps official medical-care CPI data for premium projections when it suits her narrative,” Bessent said.
“The Harvard Square inflationista is offering a statistical sleight of hand, not a serious assessment of today’s U.S. economy.”
Warren, the ranking Democrat on the Senate Banking Committee, launched her tracker Wednesday, arguing that Trump’s economic policies have increased the financial pressures facing American families. The dashboard reports cumulative inflation of 5.2 percent since December 2024 and estimates that higher prices have cost the average household an additional $3,388. It also tracks groceries, gasoline, electricity, rent, health coverage, and child care.
Bessent’s response challenges both the selection of those measures and the periods Warren uses to assess the administration’s record.
The Treasury secretary’s accompanying chart, titled “Trump Affordability Tracker: The Full Picture,” reports that inflation-adjusted weekly wages have risen 1.5 percent since January 2025. It compares that gain with a 3.9 percent decline over Biden’s full term.
Warren’s wage measure instead begins in February 2026, at the start of the Iran war, and tracks inflation-adjusted hourly earnings through August. That shorter period excludes the earlier months of Trump’s presidency. Weekly earnings also reflect hours worked, making them a better measure of paychecks than the hourly pay series Warren uses.
Bessent’s chart puts annualized core inflation under Trump at 2.5 percent, compared with 4.7 percent under Biden. Core inflation excludes food and energy. The chart also says August’s year-over-year core inflation rate was 2.4 percent, the lowest since March 2021.
For groceries, the administration reports an annualized price increase of 2.1 percent under Trump, compared with 5.3 percent during Biden’s presidency. Rent inflation is listed at an annualized 3.0 percent under Trump and 5.6 percent under Biden.
Those comparisons measure the pace of price increases over each administration’s respective period. Warren’s dashboard emphasizes the accumulated increase in prices since December 2024 and estimates the additional spending required to purchase the same quantities households bought in 2024. Its dollar estimates sum those additional costs month by month.
Bessent also took aim at Warren’s health care calculation. Her tracker reports a 14.6 percent increase, or $929, based on an estimate of workers’ annual contributions toward employer-sponsored family health insurance.
According to the dashboard’s methodology, that figure combines the actual average employee contribution reported for 2025 with a projected 6.5 percent increase in employee paycheck deductions for 2026. The methodology describes the resulting figures as illustrative estimates. It does not use the Bureau of Labor Statistics’ medical-care consumer price index.
The administration’s response also points to broader measures of household finances. Its chart reports record inflation-adjusted median household income of $87,460 in 2025, up 2.6 percent in that year, compared with a cumulative 1.9 percent increase over Biden’s four years. It lists the official poverty rate for 2025 at 10.2 percent.
On employment, the chart highlights one million additional private-sector jobs alongside a reduction of 328,000 in the federal workforce. It also reports that nominal weekly earnings rose 5.6 percent through July 2026, more than twice the 2.6 percent increase in home prices measured by the Federal Housing Finance Agency.
“Here is the full picture, including an apples-to-apples comparison of President Trump’s real economic results measured against the failed policies Senator Warren championed under Biden,” Bessent said.
