“One Big Beautiful Bill” did not resonate. Trump opts for “Wait Till 2026”.
Team Trump Hones New Message
Reality has set in. Trump’s policies have not and will not succeed in 2025. So, it’s Wait Till Next Year.
The Wall Street Journal reports Trump’s Team Hones Message on Economy: Just Wait Until 2026
President Trump’s advisers are counseling him to refine his economic message with a pitch to voters aimed at easing their anxiety about weak jobs growth and stubborn inflation.
Their new mantra: Just wait until next year.
In private conversations with the president, Trump’s advisers, rather than dwell on shaky economic data, have painted a rosy outlook, insisting that data will begin to improve in the first quarter of 2026, according to people familiar with the matter, including senior administration officials.
After a report showing only 22,000 new jobs in August, Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent told Trump he believes the employment numbers will start to tick up once policies from his “Big Beautiful” tax-and-spending law are fully implemented heading into next year, according to a person close to Bessent.
Earlier, at a closed-door gathering in the Oval Office, other advisers told Trump it was up to him how to publicly address the weak jobs data and he could just breeze past the information by pointing to the future, according to a senior administration official. They assured him the economic indicators will show improvements as 2025 comes to a close, the official said. [Mish: Because if they did not say that, they would be fired.]
Trump himself has changed his tune. Though the economy was instrumental in his successful re-election campaign, he now seems to prefer to focus on immigration, crime and settling scores with his perceived enemies.
During a recent event about autism, the president waved off questions from reporters about the economy. “I’d rather not talk about some nonsense on the economy. I will say this: The economy is unbelievable,” Trump said at the time. [Mish: Ah yes, the unbelievable economy. ADP is wrong, the BLS is wrong, the polls are wrong, and anyone who disagree is wrong. It’s truly unbelievable].
Trump’s early economic actions have been among the most disruptive for the economy in generations. He has imposed far-reaching tariffs on almost all imports with more to come, brought immigration to a virtual halt while scaling up deportations, and strong-armed companies into making deals with his administration.
The president initially predicted these steps would usher in a golden age. That hasn’t happened yet, even though Trump continues to boast about a strong economy. Some economic indicators are positive. Gross domestic product rose at a 3.8% annualized pace in the second quarter and is on course to grow at a similar rate for the third quarter that ended this past week.
Public opinion of Trump’s leadership on the economy has turned more negative in recent months. Just 37% of adults polled in September approved of Trump’s handling of the economy, according to an AP-NORC survey, while 62% disapproved. In a recent New York Times survey, 45% of voters said Trump had made the economy worse since taking office, while 32% said he had made it better. [Mish: The polls are wrong.]
A prolonged government shutdown could further sour voters on Republicans, particularly if healthcare subsidies aren’t extended, further increasing costs for many Americans. [Mish: This is why I expect Republicans to cave by the end of the month.]
Trump’s pollster Tony Fabrizio and longtime Trump political adviser Chris LaCivita told attendees they had briefed the president on their internal surveys showing how the “One Big Beautiful Bill” moniker wasn’t appealing to voters. Trump’s signature legislation might need a rebrand, they said, according to a person at the event. Instead, Republicans should start referring to the law as a tax cut for working families. Republicans have since embraced that framing. [Mish: Thus, we have the ever-popular “Wait Till Next Year.”]
For administration officials, changing course isn’t an option. In his first term, Trump grew frustrated with aides who would try to curb his instincts. Trump’s first-term National Economic Council director, Gary Cohn, for instance, removed trade-related letters and memos from Trump’s desk before the president could sign off on them, administration officials said at the time. [Mish: Indeed! This year it’s disagree and get fired. Trump is never wrong. And the next paragraph is the perfect example.]
Outsider advisers also pick their spots. Art Laffer, an economist who supports free trade and who advised President Ronald Reagan, doesn’t criticize Trump’s ideas in their meetings.
Laffer says he has discussed with Trump how the 1930 Smoot-Hawley Tariff Act raised import tariffs on thousands of goods, leading to retaliation and a deeper depression, to make his case for why tariffs could come back to harm the U.S. economy—all without directly saying the president shouldn’t enact them. “One of the things you have to do as an employee is you have to back the president’s decisions,” Laffer said. [Mish: Yes, sir! Only yes-men allowed.]
“The risk is that at some point a refusal to consider the full range of valid economic indicators in making policy will lead the administration into colossal blunder,” said Russell Riley, the co-chair of the presidential oral history program at the University of Virginia. [Mish: That is not a risk, it’s a given. Trump is clueless about the economy and tariffs.]
For now, though, much of the feedback Trump has received is positive. [Doh! That is the silliest comment in the article. No one can tell Trump anything else or they will get fired.]
Laffer Understands the Setup
Laffer, a free trade advocate understands he cannot say anything bad about tariffs or Trump will personally attack him.
Everyone in the administration understands the setup.
But “Wait Till 2026” is a fundamental mistake. When 2026 is bad, the message will have to change.
The beauty of a more Cub-esque “Wait Till Next Year” is the slogan never has to change.
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I hope you can take a bit of headline sarcasm because the true story follows.
September 6, 2025: Trump’s Aluminum Tariffs Seriously Backfire Already
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October 2, 2025: Trump Seeks a $10 to $14 Billion Farmer Bailout
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October 1, 2025: ADP Private Jobs Decline by 32,000 in September, Huge Negative Revisions
ADP revised August from +54,000 to -3,000 making 2 straight months of declines.
Realistically, this is the expected result from inane tariffs. Close to half of all imports are items used in manufacturing, not end consumer items.
Small businesses and end consumers are getting killed by Trump’s tariffs.
But that is OK.
Q: Why?
A: Wait Till Next Year, Silly.
Next year Trump admin will be printing whatever numbers they want, real or fake, so of course the numbers will improve in 2026! It’s as likely as the sun rising tomorrow.
Gold blows through $3,970 and trades above $3,950 as we move into the open. At this rate we will hit $4,000 per ounce by Friday!
If that does not tell you something about the State Of The Union, I have no idea what will.
Got mining stocks?
As an example:
AEM Q2 net profit margin was up 126% over 2024. Likely to hit 150% in Q3 2025.
NVDA Q2 net profit margin was up 56% over 2024. Likely to slip to 54% in Q3 2025.
Mining companies are being paid cash upon delivery of their product, Nvidia is involved with circular vendor financing…
95% of AI deployments are not revenue positive, the AI bubble bursts when?
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Was out today checking Halloween decor because I needed a few things to repair or replace some broken items. I checked the 3 dollar stores (General/Family/Tree), Walmart and Home Depot. Was surprised by how little there is available. Normally stores have a variety of decor but some had none and others next to none. Only Walmart had a normal selection of stuff.
Either stores think no one is spending this year or tariffs have made the cheap stuff impossible to import at a reasonable price (the 3 dollar stores especially had nothing). I already saw discounts on some decor (buy 1 item get 50% off on another) which normally doesn’t happen till after Halloween.
I suspect a lot of people not going to give out candy or what they give out is going to be seriously reduced (I’m going to watch to see how much decor goes up in my neighborhood which normally decorates well for Halloween and Xmas).
Call this another sign things are not well for the average person and the strain is increasing.
Don’t forget small farmers and ranchers getting killed by retaliatory tariffs too! General economic impacts have a 6 month to a year to fully materialize and in this case it’s not gonna be to the upside!
The only thing holding up GDP at this point is the 7% fiscal deficit spending, aka “Capitalism” LOL!
On the Dem side, I have not seen any alternatives from them on the big issues (other than write checks to everybody, declare everybody a winner).
What’s maybe worse? The other team: so many visions of Alice in Wonderland: the Red Queen is braying “off with their heads!” and the croquet game has corrupt hoops that walk around (think: moving goal posts) to frustrate the sincere moves of the legit players. “Kiss the ring” is in serious contention to replace “create value.”
It is Scylla and Charybdis.
Ah yes, your imagined enemies the Democrats, keep tilting at windmills while the political class blue and red continues to get rich while we fight one another. Be their Huckleberry, we can’t stop you.
Wait till next year!
We heard that same BS in 2019 just as he was bailing corporate farmers out!
In 2020, Trumps mismanagement of covid brought the nation to an economic standstill while he spun around in circles waiving his flabby arms saying it was a hoax! 1.6 million Americans died on trumps watch.
“Eat Horsey Paste”. Drink Bleach” and other idiotic statements with no acceptance of responsibility. Pathological denial from the leader of the free world? Disgusting performance.
But hey! Drug prices are down 1,500 percent!
Trump is a Malignant, Narcissistic IDIOT!
🙂
Americans want this more than they want anything else, just check the votes from last November. WE suck.
Populists remain popular until they’re not.
During the last 9 months, current composite administration approval ratings have turned steadily and decidedly underwater. This is occurring at the end of a 1982-2026 economic cycle where the 50 trillion dollar equivalent Chinese property bubble has already collapsed and is further collapsing … and at the end of a nadir to peak US citizen debt cycle, a rapidly weakening labor job market needed to sustain and grow that debt, and an inverse nadir to peak asset valuation cycle propelled ever higher by that expanding debt. Sounds like 1929, only with ally-ending tariffs preceding a crash…
A garrulous TV celebrity populist promising remedy for the idiotic open border policy and historical mass immigration – deemed absolutely excessive to most reasonable Americans, has and is concurrently peddling better times in spite of tariffs and higher health insurance – both directly paid for by those who can afford neither … all the while, enormous tax breaks have been extended to the wealthy and to corporations, whose major investments is not in American labor and manufacturing but in 15-20 trillion of stock buy-backs over the last 20 years. Golfing, blame-gaming, and congressional extended vacations will likely just add to the underwater depth of disapproval.
Yes .. just wait until next year … a populism of a very different sort may develop in the bigly recession. Who will be the alternative populist?
The system has grown unstable along the lines you outline there. I am every bit as scared of the next couple lurches to the warped versions of “left” and “right,” from here.
Since the tariffs have not caused the expected inflation, I see we now say it will happen next year. if it doesn’t happen next year we can say it will be the year after that and so forth but the WSJ assures us the inflation will come eventually.
Doug you clearly read or comprehended none of the argument. Trump’s team is saying it’s getting better next year, i.e. they can’t say it’s good now. That directly contradicts the point you are making here.
Obama synagogue and Louis Farrakhan Cubs.
Zoom to hyperbole. Wow, what a technique. Never saw that one before.
Most of us keep Michael hidden for a darn good reason.
I suspect the midterms will not be kind to Trump as by this time next year many voters will fully understand Trump’s tariffs via personal hits to their pocketbook, and for many others, hits to their system of support be it employment, investment, or dole. A downturn in the economy that I expect will further constrain government tax and tariff revenue exacerbating debt and deficit. Fed trying to maintain 2% inflation (read prop up the stock market and save their owner banks) will get it and more via interest rate cuts that further destroy dollar purchasing power. Bond vigilantes will not support government debt sales as their principle will potentially lose purchasing power more than interest returns. Foreigners will not buy US debt for the same reason coupled with Trumps disastrous foreign policy forcing the fed to monetize debt or lose all control of interest rates (as well as any credibility or respect). Debt is a primary culprit behind the mess we are in. The US government is a perfect example of the phrase “debt slave” as most of the country’s decisions are constrained by debt considerations.
I always wish our president no matter the party a successful administration for the good of our nation. That said, I will take some pleasure in Trump leaving office as the most consequentially disruptive president in our history as he also leaves with a recessionary, possibly depressionary economy and potentially the lowest approval ratings. He is earning the distinction with his disrespectful, egotistical attitude toward citizens and foreign nations combined with disastrous policies, all having failed why attempted in the past. While I am hard on Trump, I do give him credit for sealing the southern border, deporting illegals, focusing on law and order, restoring proper focus to the health agencies and restoring the exceptionalism to the military.
As the title of this post suggests, I will have to wait to see if my predictive thoughts are correct.
Democrats should make gains, but they’ll keep talking about “pregnant people”, keep putting tampons in boys’ bathrooms and keep refusing to prosecute violent criminals. They’ll probably snatch defeat from the jaws of victory.
Yeah im beginning to think it a republican talking point they use to force the dems to defend.
Watch soon as the can they will make the subject.
Well you better hope ca map redistricting works with the few other states that kicked in for trump that will be seven or eight seats i think.
When the Biden won and the Donald lost, I was sad that it was going to be bad for the country, but shed no tears for his loss. When the Donald won and the Kamala lost, I was sad that it was going to be bad for the country and shed tears.
From Trump #1 low, in Mar 2020, SPX is up almost 4,600 pts to 6,800. QQQ almost reached its 2025 top: Feb – Apr 2025 = 138pts X 1.618 ==> 626. Trump gave investors 4,600 pts. It was Trump, not NVDA. He might takeback 1,700 pts/ 2,000 pts, to Jan 2022 high area, which is also Apr 2025 low, to deflate the mag7. Trump has 3 years, until the Nov 2028 election, to shape the US for the next generation.
You and your endless numbers. You are not capable of seeing the big picture at all. Your man is a top down central planning communist. You just keep swimming in your pool of numbers. Naval gazing. Dude, I’m guessing you love chaos and think it will be so much fun to watch the people you hate suffer from his chaos. Thing is…you and yours will suffer too. Unless you plan to leave after supporting the destruction of this country. We won’t be sad to see you go.
Typical politician (however, taco isn’t really typical in many ways) who says whatever it takes to get elected and then suffers from a severe case on amnesia.
Taco is out for himself, his family and billionaire partners in crime and no one else.
TACO is the typical narcissist on the left lobe of the bell curve.
Trump is now the most powerful head of state in the world, and one of the most impulsive, arrogant, ignorant, disorganized, chaotic, nihilistic, self-contradictory, self-important, and self-serving. Trump poses a great danger to the future of humanity and the planet. He has his finger on the triggers of a thousand or more of the most powerful thermonuclear weapons in the world. The world’s only hope is that military leaders in the U.S. would step in and stop him in the event he takes insult from the leader of another country and decides to punish them.
It’s my guess that in the near future the American President ( whom ever that may be) will no longer be the most powerful head of state in the world. That title may very well pass on to China’s head of state.
Ah it wont mater by 2026 the system will be so gerrymandered to the right 30 percent of the republican vote will be he needs to keep the house.
Gold age my big ole butt. Maybe for the wealthy wanting times to like getty and those guys.
Tax reduction for families is a hoot also. Tax reduction for the wealthy. Expect them to hoard it and the market to go up more.
Washington, Oregon, California, Maryland. Extremely gerrymandered.
True there are lots of gerrymandered districts for both parties. Its kind of balanced rt now. My point the more gm it becomes in this case to the right the more people ( ie disgruntled republicans and independents ) the more it will take to turn over congress. At mid terms. Thats great if your a far rt voter. But
At some point it it becomes a minority that controls everything and then politicians are free to do what they want. It will be a club of wealthy connected people and doubt me you or anyone else on this site will be in it
I believe that the “Wait ’til Next Year” slogan originated with the Broolkyn Dodgers who lost the World Series to the NY Yankees in 1941, 1947, 1949, 1952, and 1953 before finally defeating the Yankees in the 1955 World Series.
Can confirm.
Essentially meaningless compared to the 108 year contiguous loss record set by the Chicago Cubs.
Yes, but back in the 1940’s-50’s the Cubs’ World Series winless streak was not yet so historic. In fact, the infamous Red Sox “Curse of the Bambino” lasted almost 100 years.
What’s the prob? You lived long enough to see 2016 Cubs, though I preferred the 2005 White Sox. Check whichever box, get on with your life.
Reminds me of a Fidelity ad from the early 1990s:
Financial advisor (non-Fidelity, of course): “The good news is that we have some great ideas for next year.”
Client: “Next year?!”
Trump is, and always has been a Financial and Economic illiterate!
You mean Trumps six previous bankruptcies weren’t a clue that he would screw up the country?
Who Da Thunk!
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Financial, economic, English, etc illiterate. He makes Homer Simpson seem a Mensa member.