Today, Donald Trump paraded through Michigan to peddle a manufacturing fantasy that the data doesn’t back up. A new report from Defend America Action shows what he’s leaving out: Michigan families are getting squeezed harder than ever, and the state’s auto industry is buckling under his own policies.
Michigan grocery prices have surged 27 percent since 2019, and Detroit families now spend more of their income on groceries than residents of any other major U.S. city. Electric bills are up 18 percent and natural gas prices have spiked 46 percent since Trump took office. His Big, Ugly Bill has already pushed nearly 155,000 Michiganders off their ACA coverage, and premiums for those who remain have jumped more than 20 percent.
The auto industry Trump wants credit for “reviving” is instead reeling from his agenda. GM has slashed 1,200 jobs and abandoned a $55 million Detroit plant. Fortescue walked away from a $210 million EV battery factory. XALT Energy gutted more than 300 jobs and shut down two Michigan plants. Trump’s tariffs and his attacks on clean energy investment have cost or endangered nearly 8,000 clean energy jobs in Michigan alone.
Trump can tour every factory floor he wants. He can’t tour his way out of the crisis he created.
A full copy of the report can be found here.
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