On Tuesday, MAGA Republican President Donald Trump held a rally at Mount Airy Casino Resort in Mount Pocono, Pennsylvania.
Facing pressure over the average MAGA voters' cost-of-living concerns that knocked Trump's approval ratings down to the lowest numbers of his second term, the POTUS returned to his MAGA rallies to try to bolster support.
But pundits noticed Trump's shtick is getting old for even his diehard MAGA minions.
MAGA are complaining about their cost-of-living increasing while Trump chased after a Nobel Peace Prize and sent their tax dollars to foreign governments, claiming they voted for lower grocery bills, not whatever Trump has been doing for the last 11 months.
At Tuesday's MAGA rally, Trump claimed in turn that any affordability crisis was a "hoax" created by Democrats and the increased inflation—that he claimed didn't exist—was the fault of Democratic President Joe Biden.
He also trotted out rhetoric the Trump administration tested on voters back in May. It didn't go any better when Trump tried it on stage Tuesday than it did when Trump and MAGA pundits tried it back then.
Trump apparently wasn't aware of the response another conservative MAGA mouthpiece got when they test drove telling average Americans to just buy gifts for people age 3-18 and exclude everyone else this holiday season as a solution to Trump's tanked economy and the inflation caused by his on-again/off-again tariffs.
It didn't go well.
But the POTUS still told however many people were at his casino ballroom rally that austerity—not higher wages and fewer tax cuts and bailouts for billionaires and record profit making corporations—was the answer to all their problems in a rambling, sometimes incoherent, almost 90-minute speech.
Trump told his MAGA minions:
"But [Democrats] use the word ‘affordability,’ and that’s their only word. They say ‘affordability.’ And everyone says, ‘Oh, that must mean Trump has high prices.’ No, our prices are coming down tremendously from the highest prices in the history of our country. They always have a hoax."
Regarding the higher prices caused by his tariffs and trade wars, Trump added:
"You can give up certain products. You could give up pencils. Because under the China policy, every child can get 37 pencils. They only need one or two. They don’t need that many, but you always need steel."
"You don’t need 37 dolls for your daughter, two or three is nice. But you don't need 37 dolls."
You can hear his remarks here:
Hearing what their own children can do without from a man who bragged about his gold toilet and shared photos of his own child in a gold baby carriage...
...wasn't the inspiring, compelling argument the Trump administration hoped it would be.
People pushed back on Trump's recommendations and his return to his MAGA rallies.
@ThatsGoing/X
@onelibcitizen/X
Trump also falsely claimed:
"Democrats gave you the highest inflation in history, and we're… bringing those prices down rapidly, lower prices, bigger paychecks, you're getting lower prices. Bigger paychecks, we're getting inflation, we're crushing it, and you're getting much higher wages."
The pandemic brought the highest inflation in decades—over 19%—and the Biden administration had pushed it back under 3% before Trump took office. Since January, Trump managed to push it back up over 3% primarily through his TACO tariff games costing American exporters foreign sales and American consumers money.
People just aren't swallowing Trump's grifting and lies like he's used to his base always doing.
Getting an accurate crowd size for his first MAGA rally since this summer was difficult.
Trump claimed thousands were there—just not inside where he was—and attendees said anywhere from "200" to "600-700" to as much as "1,000" people were in the room with Trump.
No one but Trump has claimed thousands of people—which included his staff, press, Secret Service, and casino personnel—were in attendance or were lined up to attend. The ballroom has a maximum capacity of 1,200 people without the stage, and was visibly not packed, according to videos and photos from even the right-wing influencers and press in attendance.
Are the smaller rooms a trick so the cognitively declining Trump will think he's still drawing crowds?
One of his only statements that didn't require a fact check was Trump's claim that three years with him is an eternity.
But even his MAGA minion base is asking questions the Trump administration would rather not answer.
According to a new POLITICO poll, half of all Americans are struggling to afford food—not pencils and dolls—and aren't willing to fall for cute catchphrases any longer, which doesn't bode well for Republicans who stand by their man going into the 2026 midterm elections.
A majority (55%) from across the political spectrum blame the Trump administration for their economic hardships.
