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In a televised speech delivered on Wednesday, Donald Trump made a series of sweeping claims about the state of the U.S., arguing that the country has reversed a period of decline and is now outperforming the rest of the world.
His remarks touched on the economy, inflation, immigration, trade, and America’s global standing, with Trump repeatedly portraying the past year as a turning point.
- Trump claimed inflation had stopped and made false claims about inflation being the highest in history under Biden.
- Trump's claim of cutting prescription drug prices by up to 600% is mathematically impossible; real cuts on drugs like Ozempic range from 65-74%.
- Trump overstated grocery price drops, citing an 82% fall in egg prices, but overall grocery costs actually rose 2.7% by September 2025.
“One year ago, our country was dead. We were absolutely dead. Our country was ready to fail. Totally fail,” Trump said.
Donald Trump repeated several false claims during his speech. Image credits: Doug Mills – Pool/Getty Images
“Now we’re the hottest country anywhere in the world. And that’s said by every single leader that I’ve spoken to over the last five months.”
So, what were Trump’s key claims, and are they true?
Inflation
During his televised address, Trump made a series of false claims regarding inflation, with one being that “inflation has stopped.”
The other claim was, “When I took office, inflation was the worst in 48 years, and some would say in the history of our country.”
Contrary to Trump’s claim, inflation has not stopped; during the Biden administration, inflation reached its highest level in roughly 40 years, not 48.
Trump’s claims on inflation and immigration under Biden are false. Image credits: Samuel Corum/Getty Images
The all-time high for inflation in the U.S. was actually in 1920, when it reached about 23.7% under President Woodrow Wilson, largely driven by post-World War I economic disruptions.
Biden’s record-high inflation, at 9.1%, was recorded two years before Trump’s inauguration, and had dropped to 3%, which is the figure Trump inherited.
“It’s not stopped, it’s 3%. In fact, September, that 3% rate was the fifth consecutive month that inflation had increased,” CNN fact-checker Daniel Dale said.
President Trump has repeated some of his oft-debunked lies tonight. Trump hasn’t settled eight wars; he hasn’t secured anything close to $18 trillion in investment; crime wasn’t anywhere close to record levels under Biden; Trump didn’t inherit anything close to the worst…
— Daniel Dale (@ddale8) December 18, 2025
“The president also said that he inherited the worst inflation since, he said, some might say, in the history of the country: he inherited 3% inflation in January.
“Even the 9.1% peak of the Biden era in June 2022 was about a 40-year high, not a 48-year high, nowhere close to the all-time high of 23%.”
Prescription drug prices
Trump made bold and “mathematically impossible” claims about the price of prescription drugs.
He claimed that prices had been slashed by as much as 600%, which would essentially mean Americans were being paid to buy their own prescriptions.
“I’m doing what no politician of either party has ever done,” Trump said. “Standing up to the special interests to dramatically reduce the price of prescription drugs.
Prescription drug prices have not decreased 600%. Image credits: Spencer Platt/Getty Images
“I negotiated directly with the drug companies and foreign nations, which were taking advantage of our country for many decades, to slash prices on drugs and pharmaceuticals by as much as 400, 500, and even 600 percent.
“In other words, your drug costs will be plummeting downward, and I use the threat of tariffs to get foreign countries who would never have done it to pay the cost of this giant dollar reduction. They stop ripping us off. And it began as of four days ago.”
Cutting drug prices by 100% would mean that pharmaceutical companies slashed prices to $0—anything more than that would put prices in the negative.
BREAKING: In a manic, shouting speech, Trump demonstrated that he still doesn’t know math, as he insisted he’s slashed drug prices by 600%, meaning drug companies will be paying patients.
That’s not how it works, Donald.pic.twitter.com/0Vi9cWJLOc
— Really American 🇺🇸 (@ReallyAmerican1) December 18, 2025
Dale described the figures given by Trump as “mathematically impossible.”
One of the price-cutting deals that Trump has announced is an agreement to make major weight-loss drugs, such as Wegovy, Ozempic, and Mounjaro more affordable for millions of Americans.
However, those announced price cuts are nowhere near Trump’s astronomical figure.
The price of Ozempic is slated to decrease 65% under the deal, while Wegovy will see about a 74% decrease, and Zepbound, if approved, will drop around 68%.
Grocery prices
One thing that many Americans have been struggling with this year is the cost of living crisis, with higher living costs making it harder to make ends meet.
While polling from Politicorecently found that 46% of Americans view the cost of living crisis as the worst in memory, Trump has repeatedly dismissed affordability concerns.
The president has continually described affordability as a Democratic hoax.
Egg prices have reduced but many other groceries have not. Image credits: Justin Sullivan/Getty Images
During his speech, he claimed, “I am bringing those high prices down and bringing them down very fast.
“The price of eggs is down 82% since March, and everything else is falling rapidly. And it’s not done yet, but boy, are we making progress. Nobody can believe what’s going on.”
While the price of eggs has decreased, many other product prices have increased.
Dale said, “He said the price of eggs has fallen, which is true, but then he said everything else is falling rapidly, everything else is not falling rapidly.
Trump: I am bringing the high prices down and bringing them down very fast. pic.twitter.com/dwxs14NLhv
— Acyn (@Acyn) December 18, 2025
“Even on groceries in particular, far more products have increased in price this term than have decreased.”
At the time of Trump’s speech on Wednesday, the latest Consumer Price Index (CPI) data available, covering September, indicated that grocery prices had risen roughly 2.7% compared with September 2024.
Prices were also about 1.4% higher than in January 2025, when Trump took office, and increased approximately 0.3% from August to September.
CPI data for November is expected to be published on Thursday. However, analysts say it is unlikely it will show that grocery prices were down under Trump.
As well as claiming grocery prices had plummeted, Trump claimed that the price of gasoline was lower.
Gas prices are the lowest in four years. Image credits: Lori Van Buren/Albany Times Union via Getty Images
He said, “Gasoline is now under $2.50 a gallon, and in much of the country, in some states, it, by the way, just hit $1.99 a gallon.”
According to price tracking site GasBuddy, only about 100 stations out of around 150,000 are $2 a gallon.
Data published by AAA shows that only four states—Oklahoma, Arkansas, Iowa, and Colorado—had an average price below $2.50 for a gallon of regular gas.
However, AAA did confirm that gas prices are at the lowest they have been in four years, with the national average at $2.94.
Immigration
Trump also repeated a false claim that 25 million migrants entered the country under the Biden administration.
Official figures from U.S. Customs and Border Protection show that more than 10.8 million migrants were encountered entering the U.S. from the start of the Biden administration in January 2021 through 2024.
Of those, millions were removed through expulsions and deportations.
“Our border was open. And because of this, our country was being invaded by an army of 25 million people, many who came from prisons and jails, mental institutions and insane asylums,” Trump claimed.
Trump made false claims about immigration under Biden. Image credits: John Moore/Getty Images
“They were drug dealers, gang members, and even 11,888 murderers, more than 50% of whom killed more than one person. This is what the Biden administration allowed to happen to our country, and it can never be allowed to happen again.”
While Trump has repeatedly claimed that many of those who entered the U.S. were sent from prisons or mental institutions, there is no substantive evidence to support this claim.
Migration experts and specialists in global prison systems say there is no indication that foreign governments have emptied prisons or psychiatric facilities to send people to the U.S.
Trump has at times cited specific countries to support his claim.
Trump: Our border was open and because of this our country was being invaded by an army of 25 million people. Many who came from prisons, jails, mental institutions, and insane asylums pic.twitter.com/L27VDGrxc9
— Acyn (@Acyn) December 18, 2025
In response, officials from the Democratic Republic of Congo and the Republic of Congo, both named by Trump, previously told CNN that the allegations were false.
“He made false claims there, saying that an army of 25 million people invaded the country under President Biden,” Dale said.
“Leaving aside this army rhetoric, the number was not even close to 25 million. It was under 11 million, and that counts millions of people who were rapidly expelled from the country.”
He added, “Experts on global prison policy have expressed bafflement at his claims that numerous foreign leaders emptied prisons to somehow send criminals to the U.S. as migrants.”
Investment
Trump’s claim on investment is widely exaggerated.
“Already, I’ve secured a record-breaking $18 trillion of investment into the United States, which means jobs, wage increases, growth, factory openings and far greater national security,” Trump said.
“Much of this success has been accomplished by tariffs, my favorite word, tariffs, which for many decades have been used successfully by other countries against us, but not anymore.”
Trump: Already, I have secured a record-breaking $18 trillion of investment pic.twitter.com/oYkJSaGX2Q
— Acyn (@Acyn) December 18, 2025
It is fair to say that Trump-era tariffs contributed to increased U.S. investment in certain industries by encouraging domestic production, though the overall impact on investment was mixed and shaped by several other economic factors.
Official figures published by the White House show that investment into the U.S. this year was $9.6 trillion, and even that figure has been described as an exaggeration.
“A detailed review shows even that is a wild exaggeration that counts a lot of vague semi-pledges and non-pledges and does other bad math,” Dale noted.
Eight wars claim
Trump once again repeated his claim to have ended eight wars during his first year in office.
“I’ve restored American strength, settled eight wars in 10 months, destroyed the Iran nuclear threat, and ended the war in Gaza, bringing for the first time in 3,000 years peace to the Middle East, and secured the release of the hostages, both living and dead,” he said.
The claim that Trump ended eight wars in 2025 is widely disputed.
Among the conflicts cited are tensions between Armenia and Azerbaijan over the Nagorno-Karabakh region, a truce between Thailand and Cambodia after a border clash, and renewed diplomatic efforts between Rwanda and the DRC.
⏳ Falling behind: Trump’s ‘8 wars’ scoreboard keeps slipping
🗓 Last month it was “8 wars in 9 months.” Now it’s “8 wars in 10.” Either the “peace machine” is slowing down — or the math department is.
👎 The “8 wars” brag is a mix of credit-grabbing and made-for-TV conflicts… pic.twitter.com/JYZz9Sk4hQ
— Viral Video News (@viralvideonews3) December 18, 2025
Trump has also pointed to a ceasefire between Israel and Iran, along with agreements involving India and Pakistan, Egypt and Ethiopia, and Serbia and Kosovo.
While each represents some form of diplomatic engagement or temporary pause in hostilities, analysts note that none amount to a comprehensive peace settlement that brings the underlying conflicts to a definitive close.
Additionally, most of those conflicts were not active wars, but rather long-standing disputes or intermittent border skirmishes.
“President Trump has not settled eight wars—that list includes various situations that were not even wars and some conflicts that have not actually been resolved,” Dale said.
People in Palestine are still dying. Image credits: Abed Rahim Khatib/Anadolu via Getty Images
As well as Trump’s claim to have ended eight wars, he spoke of peace in the Middle East.
According to the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA), citing the Gaza Ministry of Health, at least 379 Palestinians have been killed since the ceasefire began on October 10.
A further 992 people have been injured, and 627 bodies have been retrieved from under the rubble.
Shelling and airstrikes have also continued across the Gaza Strip, the OCHA said.C
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