Despite the rosy picture President Joe Biden tried to paint of the economy under his watch during a speech Wednesday in Chicago, his policies have been a gut punch to Americans, former Arkansas GOP Gov. Mike Huckabee told Newsmax.
"When you have interest rates that climb to the level that they have in a short period of time, it means American families' buying power has been gut-punched," Huckabee, a candidate for the Republican presidential nomination in 2008 and 2016, told "Eric Bolling The Balance." "You were thinking about buying a new house, it's going to be a smaller one now. You're thinking about adding a room or doing some landscaping. Probably, you're not, especially if you have to finance it.
"All of those things that Americans were in the process of doing and wanting to do and even having the money to do under [former President Donald] Trump because of deregulation and tax cuts, now those things have to be shelved."
Huckabee said Biden does not have a clue about the pain Americans are feeling regarding their lack of spending power.
"Joe doesn't understand it. He doesn't feel it," Huckabee said. "My gosh, he doesn't even know how to get off the platform when he finishes his speech; somebody has to come up and lead him by the hand off the stage."
Huckabee said there is no real sense in the U.S. that anyone is saying how wonderful the economy has been under Biden. In fact, an Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research poll released Wednesday showed only 34% approved of the way the president was handling the economy, and just 30% believed the economy was in good shape.
"First of all, they know what it's costing them to go buy groceries," Huckabee said. "They know what it's costing them to buy gas. And they know what it was like when Trump was president. And so, they look at the comparison. They look at utilities. They look at clothing. Travel is up substantially from what it was.
"If you just start taking everything into consideration, I don't know of anybody who is saying, Wow, I'm doing so much better."
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