As prices rise for Georgians and the rest of the country, President Trump is backtracking on candidate Trump’s promise to “lower costs on Day 1.” Now, 23 days into his presidency, Trump is downplaying and walking back his biggest campaign promise – and economists predict that costs will only continue to rise, expecting Trump’s tariffs will raise end-of-year inflation to 2.8%. 

Case in point: Georgia-based Waffle House – famously a barometer for outside conditions – recently added a $.50 per egg surcharge to combat skyrocketing prices. The Trump Administration, who are more than willing to suppress information they don’t like, forced the Atlanta-based Centers for Disease Control and other health agencies to cease all external communication even as an outbreak of bird flu adds upward pressure on prices. 

Trump’s only answer, unilaterally slapping tariffs on foreign goods, only adds more pain being felt by American consumers. “If the Trump administration moves forward with the tariffs it has planned … American consumers will pay the price, and they are also going to hurt American businesses,” said Brown University Professor of Economics ?ebnem Kalemli-Özcan. 

Coastal Georgia, which is home to two of the nation’s busiest ports, is bracing for the impact that Trump’s tariffs on our biggest trading partners will have. As Georgia economics expert Thomas Fellows points out, “The sad thing is with these tariffs, they could really affect your lower, lower-middle, and middle-class families.”

“Donald Trump promised to lower costs on day one, and 23 days into his presidency, prices are on the rise and will only rise higher if he continues arbitrarily adding taxes to products Americans buy with his unilateral tariffs,” said DPG spokesperson Alex Yerkey.