FACT FOCUS: Trump boasts about the economy but there’s more to the story

President Donald Trump has been extolling his economic accomplishments on social media and at events like a rally at a Las Vegas resort Wednesday. He touts recent record stock market highs and claims a boom in hiring, manufacturing and investment. Some of the claims are clearly true, some exaggerated, some unclear.

Ahead of Nov. 3 midterm that will determine whether Trump’s Republican Party will retain full control of Congress, voters are frustrated with the economy and the high cost of living.

Only 32% of U.S. adults approved of Trump’s handling of the economy in an AP-NORC poll conducted in late July. The same poll found that 69% of Americans characterized the economy as “poor.” Many said the cost of everyday essentials like groceries and gas was a “major” source of stress in their lives.

Here’s a look at the facts.

The number of jobs in the U.S. keeps hitting records but that’s not the full story

TRUMP: “More Americans are working in the United States right now than at any point in the history of our country.”

THE FACTS: True, but this needs context. The economy adds jobs most months, so U.S. payrolls are constantly hitting new highs. Jobs have increased in the United States 65 of the last 80 years. In June, the United States had nearly 159 million jobs (not including farm workers). And that was, in fact, a record. If Friday’s July jobs report shows another uptick, as expected, U.S. payrolls will hit another high.

In Trump’s second term, however, job growth has slowed considerably. Last year, companies, government agencies and nonprofits added just 9,700 jobs a month – the weakest hiring outside a recession since 2002. So far this year, they’ve been creating 92,000 jobs a month, considerably better but unimpressive by historical standards.

During President Joe Biden’s four years in office, employers added an average of nearly 329,000 jobs a month. Those totals were inflated by a record-breaking hiring surge in 2021 and 2022 that followed the end of COVID-19 lockdowns. But even in Biden’s last two years — 2023 and 2024 — job growth averaged 166,000 a month.

High interest rates, Trump’s own immigration crackdown and the ongoing retirement of Baby Boomers are contributing to lower job growth.

The U.S. stock market just keeps setting records

TRUMP: “The stock market has set 74 all time highs just since our short time that we’ve been back.”

THE FACTS: It’s unclear what exact stock market measure Trump is referring to. But the S&P 500 — an index for the biggest public companies in the U.S. — has hit a new record 64 times since the start of Trump’s second term in January 2025, per a count from investment research firm CFRA. It’s hit 74 new highs since the 2024 presidential election.

U.S. stocks soared to their latest record earlier this week, and have hovered near those all-time highs since. The rally is being driven by a surge in profits for companies in the S&P 500 — they’re on track for the best quarterly profit growth since the second quarter of 2021.

A recent drop in the price of oil has also helped as investors remain hopeful about Trump’s latest claims of a coming deal to reopen the Strait of Hormuz, a key waterway for the flow of fuel. Still, promises about Hormuz’s future have unraveled before — and uncertainty over the U.S. war with Iran has led to market volatility. Beyond the war, some of the biggest swings have been due to the frenzy ( and skepticism ) around the value of artificial-intelligence technology.

Manufacturing shows improvement, related hiring not so much

TRUMP: “Manufacturing is BOOMING! Factory activity just hit its fastest pace in more than FOUR YEARS, far exceeding expectations … American Manufacturing is BACK!

THE FACTS: U.S. factories have indeed pulled out of a long slump in the past few months — but they aren’t creating many jobs.

In comments on his Truth Social platform Tuesday, Trump appeared to refer to a report out the day before from the Institute for Supply Management, a trade association of purchasing managers. The institute’s closely watched survey showed that U.S. manufacturing activity had expanded for seven months and in July hit the highest level since May 2022.

The upswing reversed a long losing streak for American manufacturing, which was in decline all but two months between November 2022 through December 2025, according to the the ISM survey.

Trump’s signature economic policy — massive tariffs — is meant to pressure manufacturers into moving production and factory jobs to the United States from overseas. But an uptick in production has not translated into a manufacturing hiring boom. In fact, the United States had 95,000 fewer factory jobs in June than it did before Trump returned to the White House in January 2025.

So far this year, U.S. manufacturers have added just 18,000 jobs, or 3,000 a month. Part of the problem is that today’s factories are automated and don’t need nearly as many workers as they did in the ’60s and ’70s heyday of American manufacturing. Trump’s tariffs have also hurt some manufacturers by driving up the cost of imported steel, aluminum and other inputs they need to create their products.

Sal Guatieri, senior economist at BMO Capital Markets, said the “reshoring″ of American manufacturing might eventually bring some factory jobs back to the United States, but it’s ”premature″ to say that is happening in a significant way now. He attributes most of manufacturing’s recent improvements to the AI investment boom.

Exports increase although the overall picture is mixed

TRUMP: Exports have skyrocketed “to the highest level in American history” — and the U.S. “is on track to export unprecedented $2.5 trillion in goods this year alone, something everyone thought was impossible.”

THE FACTS: Per the Bureau for Economic Analysis, seasonally-adjusted exports of U.S. goods hit an all-time monthly high of over $221.8 billion in April of this year. But there’s been a bit of a decline since.

In June — the latest month with data available — America’s seasonally-adjusted exports of goods amounted to about $206.9 billion, the BEA said. And exports of goods like U.S. crude oil, gold and computers all fell by billions of dollars. All the while, the value of goods the U.S. imports (nearly $388 billion in June) continues to far surpass how much the country sends abroad.

That said, the value of U.S. goods exports is still higher at the midpoint of 2026 than it was at this time last year. In 2025, seasonally-adjusted exports goods hit nearly $1.09 trillion through June — and ended the year at a record $2.19 trillion, per BEA. By comparison, those goods exports for the first six months of 2026 now amount to about $1.25 trillion and would hit Trump’s $2.5 trillion estimate if the trend continues until the end of the year.

Few facts to support Trump’s claims about investment

TRUMP: “With TRILLIONS OF DOLLARS of new Investment pouring into the United States, and more Factories, more Construction, and more High Paying Jobs on the way, the results are impossible to hide.”

THE FACTS: In his Truth Social post Tuesday, Trump didn’t put an exact dollar figure on the surging investments he claimed. But in May he told a group of small business owners that they totaled a staggering $18 trillion. He didn’t say exactly where his numbers came from, and the White House website cites a lower figure of $10.7 trillion that appears to be padded with some investment commitments made during the Biden presidency.

Either way, the numbers seem implausible. Total private investment in the United States was running at an annual pace of $5.7 trillion from April through July this year. And the BEA reported last month that foreign direct investment in the United States increased last year by $266 billion. Direct investment includes money sunk into such things as factories and offices but not financial investments like stocks and bonds.

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Find AP Fact Checks here: https://apnews.com/APFactCheck.