Socio-Political - National

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Trump Says We Have the “Hottest” Economy. Markets Tell a Different Story. The U.S. economy entered 2025 as the “envy of the world.” It exited well behind its peers. The Bulwark Catherine Rampell Jan 04, 2026 MANY OF US HAVE BEEN raising hue and cry about the irreversible damage Donald Trump has wreaked on the economy. Tariffs! Corporate shakedowns! Destruction of research institutions! Deletion of data! Politicization of the Federal Reserve! Alienation of our allies! Socialization of private companies!

And of course, the collapse of the rule of law. All of these things should be terrible for the U.S. economy, especially in the long term. And yet to date, the stock market has seemingly shrugged it all off. In fact, markets look somewhat ebullient. In 2025, the S&P 500 grew a solid 16 percent—far better than the average year, and better than many forecasts, particularly in the wake of Trump’s Liberation Day tariffs.So what’s going on? Why aren’t investors pricing in all these risks?

Some of it may be that they believe there’s a huge, sustainable Trump boom just around the corner. It didn’t come by the end of 2025, but perhaps it’ll arrive this quarter . . . or next quarter . . . or the end of 2026, per the latest goalpost-moving forecasts from Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick. But there are other ways to interpret what’s going on. None of them are particularly assuring:

U.S. markets actually aren’t doing that great, when compared to our global competitors.
The lion’s share of growth here in the United States—in both financial markets and hard economic data—is driven by a single sector: A.I . . .
.Which looks an awful lot like a bubble right now.

I find these explanations to be more persuasive than the hope that a new economic golden age is about to dawn. And to understand why, it’s worth recapping why you should worry about the long-term damage from Trump’s policies in the first place. LET’S START WITH something that should go without saying: Democracy and the rule of law are good for their own sake. But they also matter quite a bit to the U.S. economy. A country that protects property rights; that has free capital markets; that has a stable and predictable regulatory regime; where all citizens are equal before the law; where individuals don’t fear being expropriated by the state without cause; and where private contracts can be enforced regardless of political connections is generally a better place to do business. All these features are among the reasons the United States has long been the richest country on earth. It’s also why we have attracted so much foreign capital. When property rights aren’t protected and the justice system operates to reward friends and punish enemies, doing business is harder. People don’t have the certainty they need to invest here, or study here, or start businesses here. “If businesses can’t predict what the law will be next year or even next month they will pause,” Nick Bloom, an economics professor at Stanford, told me. “No firm wants to invest to suddenly discover the government is now taxing you twice as much or has banned your product.”

In fact, there was a Nobel Memorial Economics Prize awarded in 2024 on “how institutions are formed and affect prosperity.” Here’s how the Nobel committee, in press materials released with the award, summarized the laureates’ findings: “Institutions that were created to exploit the masses are bad for long-run growth, while ones that establish fundamental economic freedoms and the rule of law are good for it.” Much of that prize-winning research looks at developing countries. But lately we have plenty of cautionary tales here in the United States.Today, companies must fritter away precious resources finding ways to bribe appease a mercurial president, via gilded trophies, fake accolades and unpopular movie sequels. Or they waste their energy scheduling and canceling and then uncanceling shipments of imported goods, depending on Trump’s latest tariff tweets. Or maybe they’re holding off on investment entirely, because there’s too much uncertainty. This affects even the sectors Trump is ostensibly trying to help, such as energy.

“With all the changing regulations a bunch of wind-farm investments are massively lossmaking and all investment has stopped,” Bloom said. “This will not only damage wind farms, but other energy investments as related industries fear being next. If you are thinking of building a big coal station, sure the Trump administration is in your corner today. But maybe next month Trump decides he prefers oil or gas, or the next administration thinks you should be taxed twice as much. So not surprisingly even coal plants are not rushing to invest.” THE HARD ECONOMIC DATA are somewhat dated and backward-looking, especially right now due to the recent government shutdown. What data we do have are not super encouraging, given that three of the past six months saw job losses. But we do have real-time data from stock markets, which are supposed to be forward-looking. The White House has been quite eager to tout that data because U.S. markets appear to be up—a fair bit. Aides often crow about new market highs. And Trump often claims that the United States is “the hottest country anywhere in the world,” and that all foreign leaders admit it.

But the numbers appear less impressive when you look a little closer. In reality, U.S. markets have been relatively laggard since Trump took office, when compared to the rest of the world. As you can see, non-U.S. markets grew by nearly twice as much as U.S. markets did last year, according to data from the financial services company MSCI. By other metrics, too, the United States has been losing its premium against other countries. The dollar is slumping against other currencies, and in 2025 had its biggest decline since 2017 (the first year of Trump’s prior term). As Bloomberg’s Robert Burgess pointed out, every major currency appreciated against the U.S. dollar in 2025.

The American economy may have entered 2025 as the “envy of the world,” according to The Economist, but it exited somewhat worse for wear. Then there’s the question of what drove growth here in the United States. The answer is, overwhelmingly, artificial intelligence.......read on, there's still more https://www.thebulwark.com/p/trump-says-we-have-the-hottest-economy-markets-tell-different-story?utm_source=post-email-title&publication_id=87281&post_id=183294287&utm_campaign=email-post-title&isFreemail=true&r=mwxsy&triedRedirect=true&utm_medium=email

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Democratic Doctors Are Pouring Into Politics. Thank Trump and RFK Jr. Plus: How one group is working to STEM the tide of Trumpism. Bulwark Jill LawrencE Aug 19, 2025 Political commentators called 1992 the “Year of the Woman” when a record four women were elected to the Senate. The label was revived when 102 women were elected to the House in 2018. Seven years later, there’s a new trend: Doctors and medical professionals are flooding the politics zone, with backup from scores of STEM colleagues in fields like meteorology, engineering, biology, technology, and math.

Already in this 2025–26 cycle, 314 Action—dedicated to helping Democrats with science backgrounds win local, state, and federal elections—says more than 150 doctors have reached out about running for office in nearly three dozen states. The group, cheekily named after pi, expects a historic wave of doctors and scientists to launch campaigns.

The first record-setting year for women followed outrage at the all-white, all-male Senate Judiciary Committee minimizing law professor Anita Hill’s 1991 allegations of sexual harassment against Supreme Court nominee Clarence Thomas. The second came in the wake of Donald Trump’s 2016 Electoral College victory, despite his infamous “grab them by the pussy” Access Hollywood tape, multiple women accusing him of sexual misconduct, and the 2017 start of the #MeToo movement. Shaughnessy Naughton, president of 314 Action, says this year’s wave of STEM candidates arises from the constant assaults on science, data, and public health by the Trump administration and “a complicit Republican Congress,” epitomized by the confirmation of Robert F. Kennedy Jr. In his nearly two hundred days as secretary of health and human services, this anti-vaccine conspiracymonger has unleashed daily onslaughts of disinformation, misinformation, confusion, and policies that endanger American lives and health. “That has motivated a lot of folks from health backgrounds to see this as a moment where there’s only so much they can do from within their exam rooms. If they want to have a greater impact on improving the outcomes and lives of their patients and community, we need them to step up and get elected,” Naughton, a chemist, said in an interview. “They need to go beyond waiting to be tapped for their expertise and really claim a seat at the table.”

Health issues, including insurance access, COVID, gun violence, and abortion rights, have been undercurrents ever since Naughton founded 314 Action in 2016 after losing a House primary in Pennsylvania. But now public health and eroding access to care are defining issues. Between RFK Jr.’s distortions and Trump’s new law cutting Medicaid access and Affordable Care Act subsidies, it should not be surprising that, according to Naughton, two to three doctors a week are launching campaigns at all levels of government. One of her group’s current marquee candidates is former Ohio Health Department Director Amy Acton, a physician running virtually even with MAGA poster boy Vivek Ramaswamy in the 2026 Ohio governor’s race. Other 314-backed candidates include at least two with a notable combination of medical credentials and the military service Democrats often rely on to signal they are tough and patriotic. Both are running for the U.S. House seats currently held by Republicans.

Kishla Askins, a physician assistant, 30-year military veteran, and former deputy assistant veterans affairs secretary, is in a crowded primary to succeed retiring GOP Rep. Don Bacon in a Democratic-leaning Omaha district. Darren McAuley, a combat veteran, flight surgeon, Florida Air National Guard member, and former Veterans Health Administration doctor, now at the Orlando College of Osteopathic Medicine, is challenging first-term GOP Rep. Laurel Lee for a Tampa-area seat. Naughton compares her group, which has six million grassroots donors and supporters, to a business incubator. She describes a soup-to-nuts approach tailored to political novices: find pickup opportunities, recruit candidates, help them put together a team, a staff, a finance plan, and a communications strategy, help them fundraise and prepare for debates, and make direct campaign donations as well. Former STEM employees across the federal government—fired, laid off, or so disgusted they quit—are not yet in the mix of recruits, but that could change in the coming months. In 2024, Naughton said, 314 Action helped elect seven House members, six of them state legislators who had received the group’s help to get that foothold in politics. “It reinforced how important it is to invest at all levels. We built a pipeline of talent,” Naughton said.

She and the 314 team have already endorsed 113 candidates in 2025 state and local races for legislature, mayor, city council, school boards, and other offices. They haven’t yet started to look at downballot 2026 races, most of which have yet to launch, but they are already working with nearly fifty 2026 candidates for House, Senate, and governor. House endorsements include an Iowa engineer, an Illinois mathematician, and a Minnesota doctor who are challenging Republican incumbents. Statewide, the group has officially endorsed Acton for Ohio governor and South Carolina pediatrician Annie Andrews, one of several Democrats vying to take on Republican Sen. Lindsey Graham. Longer term, 314 Action has named Hawaii Gov. Josh Green (a family doctor) and Rep. Lauren Underwood (a nurse) co-chairs of a $25 million initiative that aims to elect 100 health professionals to local, state and federal office by 2030. The group made a splash last week by pledging $1 million to California’s Democratic redistricting project, part of its larger commitment to flipping House seats in the state......read on https://www.thebulwark.com/p/democratic-doctors-are-pouring-into-politics-trump-rfk-stem-congress

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Rising power prices become political problem for Trump and are becoming a political liability for Republicans as electricity costs outpace inflation.The Hill Rachel Frazin - 09/05/25 Rising power prices are becoming a political liability for Republicans as electricity costs outpace inflation.A recent Consumer Price Index report found electricity prices were rising at double the rate of inflation, having increased 5.5 percent over the past year. And the general public may be starting to take notice “In the last couple of years, different items that have gone up in price have become media concerns. They become very visible, people get very angry — and I think electric rates are heading in that direction,” said Mark Wolfe, executive director of the National Energy Assistance Directors’ Association. Wolfe said that if rates continue to rise, “it’ll become a political issue.” The Trump administration is already seeing it as one — and trying to put the blame on Democrats and renewable energy. “That is a key challenge for us,” Energy Secretary Chris Wright told Fox Business Network’s “Mornings with Maria” when asked about utility bills this week. Wright, in a recent interview with Politico, similarly blamed “the momentum of the Obama-Biden policies.” However, he lamented, “We’re going to get blamed, because we’re in office.”President Trump has taken a similar tack, blaming renewables even though a greater supply of renewable power would actually be expected tobring costs down.On Truth Social this week, he decried “ridiculous, corrupt politician approved ‘’windmills.’” He also previously posted, “Any State that has built and relied on WINDMILLS and SOLAR for power are seeing RECORD BREAKING INCREASES IN ELECTRICITY AND ENERGY COSTS. THE SCAM OF THE CENTURY!

While on the campaign trail, Trump promised to bring down electricity prices.“Under my leadership, the United States will commit to the ambitious goal of slashing energy and electricity prices by half, at least,” he said at a rally last year. “We intend to slash prices by half within 12 months, at a maximum 18 months.”Democrats are beginning to weaponize the issue against Republicans, especially after they repealed subsidies for wind and solar energy.“The big, ugly bill is going to mean a lot of big, ugly energy bills arriving in the mail for Americans around the country,” Sen. Ed Markey (D-Mass.) said last month. Experts say a buildout of renewables would help bring down prices, but the impacts of Trump’s moves are not being felt yet. “Residential retail electricity prices are set with basically a lag,” Massachusetts Institute of Technology professor Christopher Knittel recently told The Hill. “Trump’s effects on the rate changes won’t take place until after the midterms.” But they also note some of this administration’s policies, including those that attack renewable energy, are expected to exacerbate the issue in the future. “It’s less power capacity being built, and then that means that there’s gonna be less supply of power and the same demand, so prices will be higher,” Thomas Rowlands-Rees, head of North America Research at BloombergNEF, said when asked about the repeal of renewable energy tax credits. However, Knittel said blue-state policies that require a transition to renewable energy may also be contributing to the problem.“Renewable policies in some of the blue states have put upward pressure on prices,” he said.......read on https://thehill.com/policy/energy-environment/5484941-power-bills-trump-gop-electricity-cost-inflation/

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Democrats Have to Choose: Zohran Mamdani, or Donald Trump?Jacobin Nick French August 7, 2025.With the new reporting that Donald Trump has personally talked to Andrew Cuomo about how to defeat Zohran Mamdani in the mayor’s race, New York Democratic leaders have to choose which side they’re on: Mamdani’s, or Trump’s? Since New York City’s June 24 Democratic primary, it has become clear that democratic socialist Zohran Mamdani is the only anti-Trump candidate for mayor. Even before the election, it was obvious that the incumbent mayor, Eric Adams, had essentially become Donald Trump’s vassal. In what looks very much like a quid pro quo, the Trump administration ordered federal prosecutors not to pursue corruption charges against Adams; the mayor then agreed to assist the president in his aggressive deportation drive. Adams, whose reputation with Democratic voters is in the toilet, sat out the primary and instead plans to run on two independent ballot lines: “EndAntisemitism” and “Safe&Affordable.” (The Board of Election says that election law limits him to one ballot line, but Adams isn’t known for his penchant for following the law.) There was also always plenty of reason to doubt that former governor Andrew Cuomo would stand up to Trump as mayor. In April, the president told reporters that he’d “always gotten along with” Cuomo. And as Mamdani emphasized throughout the primary campaign, Cuomo has received massive financial support from some of the same ultrarich donors who backed Trump in 2024, including billionaire hedge funder Bill Ackman.

But if there was ever any doubt about who as mayor would oppose Trump and who would cozy up to him, there isn’t anymore. Yesterday the New York Times reported that the president was considering intervening in New York City’s mayoral election. According to the Times’ sources, Trump has discussed the race with a number of politicians and business leaders to try to decide who was best positioned to defeat Mamdani — and in recent weeks has even spoken directly with Cuomo, who announced an independent campaign for mayor after his humiliating primary loss to Mamdani.

Trump has made no secret of his disdain for Mamdani, whom he has called a “Communist Lunatic” and implied he might deport from the United States. The president has also threatened to arrest Mamdani and withhold federal funding from the city if he interferes with Immigration and Customs Enforcement operations.If Mamdani does become New York City’s mayor, he will have to contend with a hostile administration in Washington. Yet yesterday’s revelations underline another disturbing truth: some centrist Democrats are willing to go as far as allying with Trump, a reactionary and authoritarian president despised by Democratic Party voters, if it will keep Mamdani out of city hall.

This fact should tell New York voters all they need to know about the actual priorities of Cuomo and his “moderate” Democratic allies — allies like Mark Penn, who worked as a pollster for both of the Clintons, as well as former New York City Council president Andrew Stein, both of whom reportedly tried to convince Trump that Cuomo was the best choice to beat Mamdani. The centrist wing of the Democratic Party is so hostile to Mamdani’s calls to tax the rich, freeze the rent, and expand public services, and to his moral clarity in opposing Israeli genocide and apartheid, that it is willing to call on the help of a president who has viciously attacked civil liberties, the safety net, and workers’ rights. The talks between Trump and Cuomo and other anti-Mamdani Democrats also cast the reluctance of some party leaders to endorse Mamdani in a new light. Despite the democratic socialist’s overwhelming victory in the primary, the highest-ranking Democrats in New York State have so far refused their official support: neither Gov. Kathy Hochul, nor senators Chuck Schumer and Kirsten Gillibrand, nor House minority leader Hakeem Jeffries have endorsed Mamdani. None of them seem prepared to back one of Mamdani’s opponents, and Hochul denounced Trump’s threats to arrest and deport the Democratic nominee. But their fence-sitting in the race is an indictment of their political commitments.

Mamdani won the support of a majority of Democratic voters in the city; he also now has the backing of most of the city’s major labor unions and a growing number of national, state, and local legislators including Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY), Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-VT), and Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-MA). His opponents, on the other hand, have the support of Trump, right-wing billionaires like Bill Ackman and Daniel Loeb, and the Israel lobby, which seems to target any politician who publicly expresses sympathy for Palestinians. https://jacobin.com/2025/08/mamdani-trump-cuomo-call-democrats

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Chuck Schumer on Notice After Zohran Mamdani Upset in NYC. Newsweek Jesus Mesa Jun 25, 2025When Zohran Mamdani walked onto a small stage in Long Island City Tuesday night to declare victory in the New York City Democratic mayoral primary, few in the political establishment expected him to be there. Fewer still grasped the full message his win delivered. The 33-year-old state assemblyman, who began his campaign for mayor polling in single digits, stunned the Democratic hierarchy by toppling former Governor Andrew Cuomo in a high-turnout primary that redrew the city's political map. Mamdani's insurgent campaign — backed by grassroots activists and first-time voters — overcame tens of millions in spending from Cuomo-aligned super PACs, endorsements from national Democratic figures, and an editorial nod from The New York Times.

"This wasn't just a local upset," said Joseph Geevarghese, executive director of Our Revolution, the progressive grassroots group that backed Mamdani's campaign. "It was a national referendum on the direction of the Democratic Party. Mamdani surged to victory despite having virtually no name recognition or institutional support within the Democratic party. His win came on historically high turnout for a New York primary and drew immediate comparisons to Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez's own upset of a longtime incumbent in 2018. For some political experts, Mamdani's win sent a clear message to the party's old guard that people are unhappy with the current direction of the Democratic Party. Polling analyst Nate Silver called Mamdani's performance "a thorough ass-whooping" in a post-election dispatch on his Silver Bulletin Substack. "Zohran thoroughly earned the win, and Cuomo and the Democratic establishment thoroughly earned the loss," he wrote.

Mamdani's win wasn't just a blow to Andrew Cuomo — it was a boost for Ocasio-Cortez. She backed him early, framed the race as a referendum on the party's direction, and rallied her base around his campaign. The result reinforced her role as a national progressive leader and positioned her at the center of a growing rebellion against the Democratic establishment. "AOC really set that model, making it easier to imagine someone like Zohran actually pulling this off," said

Democratic strategist Kaivan Shroff. "She gave people hope that this kind of win is possible — and it's happened before. A recent poll from the Honan Strategy Group suggests trouble ahead for Schumer. In a hypothetical 2028 Democratic primary, Ocasio-Cortez leads him by 21 points — 54 percent to 33 percent — among likely Democratic voters in New York City. She also holds a double-digit edge among Jewish Democrats, a bloc that has long anchored Schumer's political base. For his part, Schumer appeared to acknowledge Mamdani's momentum with a conciliatory post on X the day after the election. But party tensions are deepening. Schumer, the highest-ranking Jewish elected official in U.S. history, has come under fire from both progressives and mainstream Democrats. In March, his decision to back a Republican-led government funding bill to avert a shutdown provoked backlash within his own ranks. Only nine Democrats supported the measure, which some described as appeasement of the new Trump administration.

Criticism of Schumer now cuts across the party spectrum. Leaders including Hakeem Jeffries, Nancy Pelosi, and James Clyburn were said to privately express dissatisfaction with how Schumer handled the negotiations. The situation has become serious enough that the push for Ocasio-Cortez to challenge Schumer now has support from both centrists and progressives, according to CNN. For a Democratic Party still licking its 2024 wounds, the results in New York City are more than a fluke — they represent a cautionary tale for incumbents everywhere.....read on https://www.newsweek.com/zohran-mamdani-upset-new-york-city-chuck-schumer-aoc-primary-democrats-2090681?utm_source=STMailing&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=GistofIt&emh=7a51910293749398eff22b8bf795b4f5ed4d3ebff046adf7c9ebf33811a9eca8&lctg=66ba5f2d228cf6ff690c69da&utm_term=%5BAudience%5D%20-%20The%20Gist%20of%20It

Trump Says We Have the “Hottest” Economy. Markets Tell a Different Story.

Democratic Doctors Are Pouring Into Politics. Thank Trump and RFK Jr

Rising Power Prices are becoming a Political Liability for Republicans

Democrats Have to Choose: Zohran Mamdani, or Donald Trump?

Chuck Schumer on Notice After Zohran Mamdani Upset in NYC.

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