Donald Trump gestures, as he attends a press conference on "Trump Will Fix It", at Mar-a-Lago, in Palm Beach, Florida, U.S., October 29, 2024. REUTERS/Marco Bello
President Donald Trump pledged before taking office a second time that he would fix the U.S. economy around "very quickly," but as a new supercut from the Washington Post revealed on Tuesday, he has spent a lot of time since then asking for more time.
The video was put together by J.M. Rieger, a senior video reporter for the Post known for his revealing supercuts. Some of his past works have focused on Republicans changing their stances on tariffs after Trump pushed for them, and Republicans promising an Obamacare alternative over the years that never materialized.
"Weeks before taking office, Donald Trump promised to turn the economy around quickly," Reiger wrote in a post to X with the supercut. "Since then, the Trump administration has repeatedly asked for more time to improve the economy."
The video begins with a clip taken from Jan. 7, before Trump's second term began, when he promised, "On January 20th, the United States is going to take off like a rocket ship, but really it's already doing it."
The next clips featured commerce secretary Howard Lutnick, who on March 9 pledged that prices would come down on April 2, the day Trump announced his vast list of "Liberation Day" tariffs. However, on April 3, Lutnick promised "a whole lot of growth," but this time not until "the fourth quarter."
In the next clip, taken from April 30, Trump pinned then-recent economic bad news on former President Joe Biden, and also claimed that any bad news from the next quarter would be Biden's fault as well.
On Aug. 19, Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent once again predicted improved fortunes in the fourth quarter once the One Big Beautiful Bill kicked in, and that 2026 "could be gangbusters." However, on Sept, 5, Trump kicked the can further down the road.
"Our big year won't be really, next year, I think it'll be the year after," Trump said. "Because when these plants start opening up, it takes a period of time to rebuild them."
On Sept. 11, Lutnick then claimed that "the Donald Trump economy" would finally arrive at the start of 2026. In the clip after that, Trump claimed that improvements would "kick in" in about "a year or so" as companies returned to the U.S.
For the rest of the video, clips of Lutnick and Bessent are shown in which they suggest improvements will start to be felt in either the first, second or third quarter of 2026. It concluded with a Nov. 20 clip of Vice President J.D. Vance claiming that it would "take a little bit for every American to feel that economic boom."
Trump's reelection in 2024 was widely credited to voter dissatisfaction with economic issues like inflation and the cost of living. Conversely, dissatisfaction with Trump's lack of progress on these problems was credited with helping spur Democrats to major off-year election wins in place like New York City, Virginia and new Jersey.
Weeks before taking office, Donald Trump promised to turn the economy around quickly.
Since then, the Trump administration has repeatedly asked for more time to improve the economy.
My latest supercut for @washingtonpostpic.twitter.com/oSFZCIUBCU
— JM Rieger (@RiegerReport) December 2, 2025