Republicans Kick Off Convention Pushing Myth Of Trump’s ‘Best Ever’ Economy

MILWAUKEE — Republicans kicked off their presidential nominating convention Monday continuing to sell a myth critical to their effort to win back the White House in November: that Donald Trump created the best economy in American history.

“A rip-roaring economy,” Virginia Gov. Glenn Youngkin called it in his speech to delegates on the “Make America Wealthy Again”-themed night of the four-day gathering.

“The massive inflation caused by Joe Biden and Kamala Harris,” intoned Florida congressman Byron Donalds.

Tennessee Sen. Marsha Blackburn invoked the low gas prices when Trump left the White House in 2021 compared to now. “Bidenomics is a four-letter word,” she said.

The talking points began within months of Democrat Joe Biden moving into the White House — and remain as untrue now as they were then.

Because of the COVID pandemic, unemployment soared and the gross domestic product cratered in Trump’s final year in office, making him the first president since Herbert Hoover to leave office with fewer jobs than when he took office.

But even discounting the pandemic year, Trump’s economy had lower GDP growth and fewer new jobs in his first three years in office than predecessor Barack Obama’s final three years. Republicans, including Trump, disparaged those years as an economic disaster.

On inflation, many economists believe that the high inflation rates of 2022 and 2023 — and subsequent high interest rates by the Federal Reserve — were caused by the $5.7 trillion in COVID stimulus spending designed to keep the economy from collapsing into depression. If they are correct, it follows that two-thirds of the responsibility for inflation logically belongs to Trump, under whose watch two-thirds of the spending took place.

And while