Former president Donald Trump tied his 2024 presidential rival, Vice President Kamala Harris, to rising food prices at the second press conference that he’s held in a week, saying Americans are worse off financially since he left office.
During the Thursday afternoon press conference at his golf club in Bedminster, N.J., Trump highlighted Harris’s role in higher inflation over the almost four years that she’s been in the White House. He delivered the remarks while standing in front of two tables of groceries, including cereal, deli meat, milk, eggs, bread, and other perishables.
“You don’t have to imagine what a Kamala Harris presidency would be because you are living through that nightmare right now,” Trump said.
Harris is expected to unveil a proposed ban on “price gouging” for food and groceries, with a particular emphasis on rising meat prices, during an economic-policy speech in North Carolina on Friday.
“Harris has just declared that tackling inflation will be a Day One priority for her. It’s going to be Day One. But Day One, really, for Kamala was three and a half years ago. Where has she been? Why hasn’t she done it?” Trump asked.
While he said “grocery prices have skyrocketed” since President Joe Biden took office, there have been recent signs of much-needed improvement. According to the latest Consumer Price Index data released Wednesday, grocery prices rose at an annual rate of 1.1 percent last month. In July 2023, the annual rate was 3.6 percent. Still, Americans paid 21 percent more for their groceries last month compared with January 2021.
Peaking at 9.1 percent in June 2022, inflation has since cooled down to 2.9 percent last month compared with the same time a year ago. This is the lowest year-over-year inflation reading since March 2021.
Trump’s opening remarks lasted about 45 minutes before reporters started asking questions. The former president’s long tirade — during which he addressed immigration, energy, and other typical Trump talking points — led CNN to cut away from the news conference twice. The network noted it would return to Trump once he started taking questions from the press.
Trump gave a news briefing last week at his Mar-a-Lago resort in Palm Beach, Fla., where he said he agreed to an ABC debate on September 10 against Harris. He also challenged her to do two more debates — one on Fox News and the other on NBC. The Harris campaign said she would debate Trump on ABC but declined to accept the other two network debates. Instead, Harris plans to commit to a separate debate sometime in October.
Meanwhile, running mates Senator J. D. Vance (R., Ohio) and Governor Tim Walz (D., Minn.) have agreed to a proposed CBS debate on October 1.
Trump has accused Harris of avoiding the media since she replaced Biden atop the Democratic ticket last month. Harris still has not given a formal press conference or sit-down interview but said she would do one by the end of August.
Harris and Walz have conducted an informal interview with each other discussing music, football, and “white guy tacos.” The Harris campaign released the ten-minute conversation on Thursday.
“She refuses to do any interviews or press conferences — almost 30 days now, she has not done an interview,” Trump said on Wednesday at a campaign rally in Asheville, N.C. “You know why she hasn’t done an interview? Because she’s not smart. She’s not intelligent.”
The Republican presidential nominee also briefly mentioned the topic during his latest press conference, saying the Harris campaign is “hiding her” from the media.