Inflation, tariffs and a voter revolt: The midterm verdict on Trump's
economy
[November 05, 2026]
By JOSH BOAK
WASHINGTON (AP) — President Donald Trump was publicly humbled by
inflation in Tuesday’s midterm elections, as rising prices provoked a
blistering set of losses for Republicans in House, Senate and
gubernatorial races.
Most voters said that Trump’s own policies had smothered growth and
driven costs even higher, according to The AP Voter Poll, a survey of
roughly 100,000 midterm voters. The president’s message that the fault
lay with his predecessor, Democrat Joe Biden, didn't land. Americans saw
prices start to climb with Trump’s chaotic rash of tariffs last year,
and energy costs spiked after he launched a war with Iran in February.
About two-thirds of voters said Trump's own policies had fueled
inflation. By contrast, only about half of 2022 midterm voters said this
about Biden's policies, according to AP VoteCast.
Voters in states from California to Mississippi were broadly in
agreement that Trump's taxes on foreign imports have done more harm than
good.
The election results matched what voters had been telling pollsters for
months, but Trump had campaigned with a decidedly deaf ear.
“I’ve done a great job,” Trump said at one of his final midterm rallies
in Iowa. “Prices are coming way down.”
Voters have buyer's remorse with Trump
Democratic victories in Tuesday’s midterms signaled that most voters
don’t believe the economy or Trump is working for them.
Consumer prices are up 3.7% over the past 12 months, compared to an
inflation rate of 3% when Trump began his second term. The president
told reporters on Wednesday that the Iran war “drove the gasoline up a
little bit short-term,” but he felt the choice to fight Iran was worth
it because of its push for nuclear weapons. “If I had to do it again,
I'd have to do it again," he said.
There is no guarantee that a House and Senate with a Democratic majority
can fix an economy pestered by uncomfortably high inflation. Trump and
Congress would likely need to work on a bipartisan basis, or simply keep
the economy stable enough to allow the Federal Reserve to ratchet down
inflation through its setting of interest rates.
But voters did prefer Democrats to the status quo of a president who
could govern with little to no congressional pushback from Republicans.
About 9 in 10 voters said the cost of living was a “crucial” or “major”
factor in their vote for Congress. And about 6 in 10 of this group
backed Democratic candidates in their local House races.
The economy is still growing, but AI is a source of fear instead of
hope
The underlying economy is stronger than many Americans think, with the
S&P 500 stock index up more than 10% so far this year and the
unemployment rate at a healthy 4.2%. Investors greeted the news of
Democratic wins as a positive with stocks up on Wednesday.
Still, the major driver of growth has been the buildout of artificial
intelligence — a boom that Trump has actively stoked by refusing to
codify more aggressive federal oversight.
Voters don’t share Trump’s optimism about AI, which he has renamed
“super intelligence” in federal documents.
Instead of buying the arguments that AI would increase productivity and
accelerate growth, about 6 in 10 voters said AI will do more to hurt
society.
The technology could displace workers as jobs get automated or it could
be a financial bubble that if popped could wreak havoc on retirement
savings. Despite the anxiety, only about one-quarter of voters said AI
was a “crucial” factor.
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President Donald Trump signs a hard hat as he talks with workers at
the White House Ballroom construction site at the White House,
Wednesday, Nov. 4, 2026, in Washington. (AP Photo/Alex Brandon)
Wealth isn't trickling down to the middle class
Tech billionaires such as Meta's Mark Zuckerberg, Nvidia's Jensen Huang
and Elon Musk have become frequent guests of Trump, attending state
dinners or jetting abroad with the president. But the growing
concentration of wealth has been disconcerting for voters.
Nationwide, about 7 in 10 voters said the economy favors the wealthy,
while only about 3 in 10 said it's fair to everyday Americans. The
wealth gap has become so extreme that even a majority of voters with a
2025 household income of $300,000 or more in the tech-heavy state of
California felt the economy was tilted toward the rich.
Still, a slight majority of voters across the country had a “somewhat”
or “very” favorable impression of capitalism, compared to about
one-third who “strongly” or “somewhat" favor socialism.
But the election suggested that voters believe the government should use
its heft to help reduce the cost of healthcare. About 6 in 10 said they
wanted the government to play a “bigger role” in addressing medical
expenses. Most voters said Trump's policies have made healthcare costs
worse.
Trump caught in a trap with voters
How voters felt about the overall economy generally depended on the size
of their paychecks. While Trump campaigned on stats suggesting record
low poverty, the working poor saw their own finances as crumbling.
For those earning less than $50,000 a year, about 6 in 10 said they were
worse off now than they were two years ago before Trump became
president.
People with higher incomes felt better about the economy, but that
created a different problem for Trump. Higher-income voters were more
concerned about the state of American democracy, and voters focused on
democracy overwhelmingly broke for Democrats. Without congressional
approval, Trump laid off thousands of federal workers, altered federal
spending and imposed hundreds of billions of dollars in new tariffs that
the Supreme Court earlier this year ruled were illegal.
About 4 in 10 households with 2025 household incomes above $200,000 said
that democracy was their top issue, putting the issue about even with
the economy. Voters in most lower-income categories, on the other hand,
clearly prioritized the economy.
Overall, a slim majority of voters said government corruption was a
crucial factor for their vote, while about half said this about high
prices. Higher-income voters were much less likely than lower-income
voters to see high prices as a key factor.
What most voters took away from the past 22 months of Trump’s presidency
was that he brokered deals, took government stakes in private companies
and acted in ways that put him at the center of the economy instead of
America's workers.
Most voters — about 6 in 10 — said Trump's priorities were misplaced.
When voters were asked if Trump fought for people like them, most said
he didn’t.
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