LARRY KUDLOW: Trump and the GOP Actually Have a Strong Election Message as Long as They Make It

So one of the political lessons of the primary election season is how badly polls have been wrong. Comrade Abdul El-Sayed in Michigan was supposed to win by more than 20 percentage points, but instead barely escaped by a thin cat’s whisker.

And the extremist Francesca Hong in Wisconsin was also supposed to win by 20 points or so. But she lost by an even thinner cat’s whisker.

And there are plenty of other examples. Where am I going with all this? Well, all these polls show President Trump’s supposed unpopularity on Iran or the economy or the much-abused term affordability may turn out to be very wrong in the midterm elections. 

Now, true enough, Mr. Trump’s not on the ballot, but I think when he really gets revved up on the campaign trail, and the GOP House and Senate people nationalize the election, we’re gonna find out that actual voters will reject big-government socialism and un-American values, as Newt Gingrich calls them.

Most of the recent polls don’t get likely voters. Instead they ask adults or registered voters and they’re frequently asking loaded questions. Now, one exception is my pal John McLaughlin, whose likely voter polls show that actually, people want Mr. Trump to finish Iran off. And additionally, a large majority prefers free market capitalism to socialism.

What’s more, the economy is doing far better than the mainstream press is telling us. Mr. Trump has always scored well with working class voters of all shapes and sizes. We are in a manufacturing boom. It is the strongest in years, probably decades.

Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent keeps telling people about the 105,000 hard goods producing jobs added this year alone. And since Mr. Trump came into office, the economy has produced 93,400 factory construction jobs. Think hard hats, think working folks.

Meanwhile, financial journalist John Carney reports that manufacturing wages have increased by nearly 5 percent so far this year. And that’s twice the inflation rate. 

On top of that, we’ve seen almost 400,000 federal jobs drop, and almost 900,000 private sector jobs created, which shows the Trumpian reconstruction of Biden’s big-government socialism.

Now, speaking of affordability and inflation, the democratic socialists love to talk about it. But it was under President Biden’s big-government socialism that the consumer price index cumulatively rose 21.4 percent during his four years.

Now, recently, even with the temporary bump up in energy prices from the Iran War, Mr. Trump’s new Federal Reserve chief, Kevin Warsh, has brought the inflation rate down to near zero in the last couple of months. And frankly, just over the past six months only 2.4 percent at an annual rate, which is nearly akin to the Fed’s 2 percent target.

Also, talking about affordability, Here’s one: Prescription drug prices have been plunging. Over the past year, they have declined 3.4 percent. And during Mr. Trump’s second term, they have not increased in any single month.

Now, these are just snippets of potential national messaging. Clearly, though, Mr. Trump’s free enterprise capitalism is powering a prosperous economy. And, hopefully, it will be buttressed with some middle class tax reform as part of the midterm election package.

Now, just as clearly, Democrats favor Medicare for All and huge tax increases and a state-run economy and open borders and defunding the police and defunding ICE and packing the Supreme Court and ending the Senate and other crazy notions that I think are gonna be very unpopular with real likely voters.

So don’t pay much attention to these early polls.