US President Donald Trump addressed the nation on Wednesday, highlighting what he described as his administration’s achievements in 2025 and promising to build on his “Make America Great Again” agenda in the next year.
In a defiant 18-minute address from the White House, Trump awarded his administration straight A’s for what he hailed as a year of unprecedented American greatness.
“We are making America great again tonight, after 11 months, our border is secure. Inflation has stopped. Wages are up, prices are down. Our nation is strong. America is respected, and our country is back stronger than ever,” he said.
Using the speech as both a retrospective and a campaign-style pitch, Trump claimed to have saved the economy through aggressive tariffs and “settled eight wars in 10 months” through a series of foreign policy pivots, including a controversial peace deal for Gaza.
He pointed to “bringing our economy back from the brink of ruin” and the “strongest border in history” as evidence of a fulfilled mandate, while teasing next year’s priorities, which included tax cuts, cash giveaways and lower energy costs. The issues were expected to define next year’s midterm elections.
Asserting that he “inherited a mess” and was “fixing it”, Trump began his address with an attack on his predecessor Joe Biden. “Our border was open and because of this, our country was being invaded,” he said.
Trump ran through a list of grievances from the Biden years, citing what he called open borders, transgender athletes in women’s sports, rising crime and the “worst trade deals ever made”.
The America-first politician said he had brought prices down after what he said was a “Democrat inflation disaster”. Trump also blamed “foreign migrants” for the housing crisis and “illegal immigrants” for stealing American jobs.
“I’ve secured a record-breaking US$18 trillion of investment into the United States, which means jobs, wage increases, growth, factory openings and far greater national security,” he said, while attributing the economy’s performance to his tariff policy.
“My favourite word, tariffs, which for many decades have been used successfully by other countries against us, but not any more”, Trump added.
Earlier in the year, Trump announced sweeping tariffs against all major trading partners, including China, using emergency executive powers on the promise of bringing back manufacturing jobs and opening up new markets for American exports.
However, Trump’s narrative jarred with the political and economic backdrop.
According to the Tax Foundation, a non-profit organisation based in Washington, Trump’s tariffs amount to an average tax increase per US household of US$1,100 in 2025 and US$1,400 in 2026.
Trump secured a second term largely on a mandate to curb the high inflation that defined the era of former president Biden.
However, nearly a year into his return, price stability remains elusive. Inflation has remained stubbornly elevated, hovering near 3 per cent – significantly above the 2 per cent target that the Federal Reserve considers essential for a healthy stable economy.
US government data underscore those concerns: the economy added just 64,000 jobs in November, while unemployment rose to a four-year high of 4.6 per cent, blunting White House claims of pro-growth success. According to an NBC report published this week, manufacturing has shed 63,000 jobs so far this year.
Trump’s approval rating slid to a second-term low of 36 per cent, according to the latest PBS News/NPR/Marist poll, with 57 per cent of Americans disapproving of his handling of the economy amid rising prices and a weakening jobs market. -- SOUTH CHINA MORNING POST
