The Trump White House started the day the way it starts most days now: in a low-grade panic, desperately trying to convince Americans that everything is âA+â while the ground is clearly cracking under their feet.
In an interview with Politico, Donald Trump declared the U.S. economy âA+ plusâ and claimed itâs ânever been better.â Within hours, his chief propagandist, Caroline Leavitt, was dispatched to the cameras to sell the fantasy. Her spin? That Trump had just delivered a âhuge winâ for American farmers because China was now buying U.S. soybeans again â supposedly something that âwasnât happening under the last administration.â
For soybean farmers actually living this crisis, that line wasnât just dishonest. It was insulting.
Under the previous administration, China was buying tens of millions of metric tons of American soybeans. Then Trump launched his chaotic trade war against the world and those purchases collapsed, replaced by long-term contracts with countries like Brazil and Argentina. Farmers like Phil, a soybean grower from northwestern Wisconsin, are now losing $85 per acre they plant. Multi-year deals with foreign competitors mean this isnât one bad season â itâs a long-term wound.
Leavittâs next brag only made it worse.
She proudly touted Trumpâs â$9â12 billionâ farm aid package as proof heâs helping rural America. In reality, itâs a bailout for a disaster he created. Third-, fourth-, and fifth-generation farmers donât want a government check months from now. They want stable markets and predictable prices â not a president who blows up their livelihoods and then throws them a lifeline made of political spin.
And then thereâs the part they really donât want to talk about: the war crimes tape.
Leavitt was pressed on whether the administration would release the full video of the September 2nd strike in the Caribbean â the so-called âdouble tapâ on a fishing boat where survivors were allegedly killed in a second hit. Trump himself said on December 3rd he would release it. Now, suddenly, itâs âup to the Secretary of Warâ Pete Hath, and Leavitt is accusing Democrats of âdepravityâ for demanding the truth.
Depravity? The families of the dead just want answers. The American people want to see what was done in their name.
Senator Tammy Baldwin of Wisconsin didnât mince words. She called the White House strategy âformulaicâ:
Lie. Then blame the other side. Then distract.
While Trump world screams about tariffs and pretends bailouts are victories, the real crisis is hitting families on another front: health care. Nearly a quarter of American farmers get their coverage through the Affordable Care Act. Premiums are spiking as crucial tax credits are allowed to expire. Open enrollment is closing, and millions are staring at bills they simply cannot pay.
Baldwin tells the story of Nancy, a small business owner and cancer survivor in Milwaukee whose premiums are tripling. She cannot safely go without coverage, but the system is pushing her to the edge. And Republicans? Theyâve had over a decade to come up with a real health care plan. All they ever had was ârepeal and⊠something.â
Now, with days left in open enrollment, MAGA leaders are once again promising a âplanâ that never arrives.
Behind the bluster about âA+ economiesâ and âhuge wins,â the reality is brutal:
Farmers are bleeding cash.
Families are losing health insurance.
Lives were taken in secret strikes the public isnât allowed to fully see.
And every time the questions get too sharp, the Trump machine does the same thing: lie, attack, distract â and hope nobody notices the term is crashing in real time.
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