The problem with Trump's pitiful efforts to blame Biden for the weak the economy isn't just that he's wrong.
It's also that these tactics will almost certainly fail — because the claims are literally unbelievable
As his second term reached the 100-day benchmark, and the market’s performance became even more humiliating, the president decided that it’s no longer “the Trump stock market.” Instead, he declared online, “This is Biden’s Stock Market, not Trump’s.”
In other words, Americans were supposed to believe last year that markets were up because investors expected Trump to eventually return to power, and Americans are now supposed to believe that markets are down because investors recently remembered that Biden used to be in power.
The New York Times summarized the ham-fisted rhetorical tactics in a tidy way:
President Trump seems to have two opposing messages about the economy. Anything good should be credited to him. Anything bad is Joe Biden’s fault.
That might seem overly simplistic. It is not. Rather, this is exactly the framing the incumbent president has embraced with unnerving enthusiasm.
Indeed, the push isn’t limited to messaging about Wall Street. After the Commerce Department released the latest GDP data, which showed the U.S. economy shrinking in the first quarter of 2025 for the first time in years, Trump said these discouraging developments were Biden’s fault, too.
https://bsky.app/profile/did:plc:aunpu65mdrhwfie7ynymlzeh/post/3lo25cqt32l2q
Perhaps realizing that his trade tariffs were likely to have a sustained negative effect on the domestic economy, the Republican added that if the economy continues to shrink in the second quarter, the public should also hold Biden accountable for that.
https://bsky.app/profile/did:plc:4llrhdclvdlmmynkwsmg5tdc/post/3lo2czfwb3s2w
......As a political matter, the broader question is whether these tactics will work or not. If the president and his allies are expecting his pitch to work, they should probably lower their expectations. There are a few elements to this that are worth keeping in mind.
First
, Trump’s efforts to shift blame are likely to fail because they’re rooted in obvious nonsense. As a factual matter, the economy is struggling as a direct result of Trump’s policies. To the extent that reality affects public attitudes, the president’s arguments will fall short because they’re wrong.
Second, Trump’s attempts will probably prove unpersuasive because they’re meandering and incoheren
t. The more he careens wildly between “give me credit for apparent good news” and “blame the guy who isn’t in office for bad news,” the more people will simply tune out his palaver.
And third, the president’s pitiful attempt at the blame game will almost certainly fail because it’s far too late to work. As New York magazine’s Ed Kilgore explained,
“Rarely if ever, and certainly not since FDR, has a new administration taken office more determined to own the country, its policies, and its overall direction.”.....
This agenda carried real-world consequences that they’re responsible for —
and the phrase “you broke it, you bought it” now hangs over the White House and its economic agenda
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