Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent used a Sunday interview on CBS’s “Face the Nation” to defend the Trump administration’s economic record and push back against widespread assumptions that American families face a grim holiday shopping season. While national sentiment remains cautious, Bessent argued that core household pressures are moderating and that the administration inherited a far deeper affordability crisis than most analysts initially appreciated.
Host Margaret Brennan began the interview by citing President Trump’s April remark suggesting families might have to settle for “two dolls instead of 30” this Christmas due to elevated prices. Bessent rejected the framing and pointed to surprisingly resilient holiday indicators. “It’s actually been a very strong holiday season… there’s nothing to say that there are two dolls instead of 30 dolls,” he said, emphasizing that the economy posted 3 percent real GDP growth for 2025 despite a brief government shutdown and sustained momentum through four consecutive quarters at or above 4 percent earlier in the administration.
Toy prices have become a flash point in public debate. Industry executives have blamed tariffs and supply-chain frictions for steep increases, including a Tonka truck that jumped from $25 to $40. Bessent countered that the inflationary surge is being misunderstood. “Imported goods inflation is about 1.8 percent. It’s the service economy that’s generating inflation, which actually has nothing to do with tariffs,” he explained, pointing to a preferred Federal Reserve measure, the PCE index, currently running at roughly 2.9 percent.
Bessent did not deny that American households have struggled to manage everyday costs over the past four years, but he insisted that the root of the hardship lies with the policies of the prior administration. He described the Biden period as producing “the worst inflation in 50 years, and maybe for working Americans, the worst inflation of all time.” To illustrate the real burden on blue-collar families, Bessent highlighted an internal metric: the “Common Man CPI,” a weighted basket emphasizing food, gasoline, and rent. Under Biden, it rose by roughly 35 percent cumulatively — far worse than the official consumer price index. Bessent said that for the first time in 2025, the Common Man measure is running below headline inflation, giving lower-income families meaningful relief. “Real incomes are up about 1 percent… This year the basket of goods for working Americans — food, gasoline, rent — is coming down,” he said.
He framed the current environment around what he called the “three I’s” that created the affordability pinch: mass immigration, high interest rates, and embedded inflation. His argument positioned each as a structural driver and described the administration’s response. Mass migration, he said, depressed wages and strained housing markets, a trend he insists has reversed: “The president has closed the border. That is fixed.” High rates are falling, he added, with bond markets turning in their strongest performance since the pandemic year of 2020. As for entrenched price dynamics, Bessent predicted meaningful relief ahead: embedded inflation is expected to “roll down strongly” in 2026.
Grocery prices remain politically sensitive. While some categories remain high, Bessent pointed to sharply lower holiday staples, citing that Thanksgiving turkey prices fell 16 percent this year. Asked about the president’s new executive order directing an investigation into beef price-gouging, Bessent said consumers should not confuse it with Biden’s anti-inflation initiatives, arguing “nothing the Biden administration did worked.”
Bessent also previewed what he described as a stabilizing turn in global trade policy, including a multi-year Chinese commitment to purchase 12.5 million metric tons of soybeans for the current crop year and 25 million tons annually for the next three years. He said the agreements provide a durable lift to American farmers after years of volatility and will improve long-term rural incomes.
The White House is simultaneously launching “Trump Accounts,” a pilot wealth-building program that deposits $1,000 into a low-cost index fund for each child born between 2025 and 2028. The administration secured philanthropic commitments — led by the Michael & Susan Dell Foundation — to expand contributions for low- and middle-income families, turning what was originally a seed-capital effort into longer-term household assets.
Despite Bessent’s optimism, national polling remains sour. A recent CBS News survey found just 36 percent of Americans approve of President Trump’s handling of the economy, and only 32 percent approve of his work on inflation. Bessent suggested the gap reflects media perceptions more than underlying economic conditions but acknowledged that sentiment often lags improvements. “We’re not going to say Americans don’t know what they’re feeling,” he said. “But next year we’re going to move from affordability to prosperity.”
