Brazile: Let's thank both Obama and Trump for the economy
President Trump rejects former President Obama taking credit for the economic boom; former DNC interim chair and Fox News contributor Donna Brazile responds.
Speaking on “America’s Newsroom” on Tuesday, former DNC Interim Chair Donna Brazile said she thinks President Trump should delete the tweet where he hit back at former President Barack Obama, who in a subtle swipe at the commander in chief, claimed credit for the economic gains in both their terms.
In Obama’s tweet Monday morning, he noted the anniversary of his signing the 2009 economic stimulus package.
“Eleven years ago today, near the bottom of the worst recession in generations, I signed the Recovery Act, paving the way for more than a decade of economic growth and the longest streak of job creation in American history,” Obama wrote in the tweet, which included a photo of his signature on the bill.
President Trump fired back on Monday, tweeting that Obama's claim was a "con job."
TRUMP FIRES BACK AFTER OBAMA CLAIMS CREDIT FOR ECONOMIC BOOM: 'CON JOB'
Trump wrote on Monday, “Did you hear the latest con job? President Obama is now trying to take credit for the Economic Boom taking place under the Trump Administration. He had the WEAKEST recovery since the Great Depression, despite Zero Fed Rate & MASSIVE quantitative easing. NOW, best jobs numbers ever. Had to rebuild our military, which was totally depleted. Fed Rate UP, taxes and regulations WAY DOWN. If Dems won in 2016, the USA would be in big economic (Depression?) & military trouble right now. THE BEST IS YET TO COME. KEEP AMERICA GREAT!”
On Tuesday, Brazile explained why she thinks Trump should delete the tweet.
“We all know that when President Obama took office, the country was hemorrhaging jobs over 700,000 a month,” she noted. “When President Trump arrives in the White House, unemployment is cut in half, from 10 percent to 4.7 percent, what is it now? 3.5 percent. Eleven years of consecutive job growth.”
“So first of all, let’s just thank President Obama and also President Trump,” Brazile said. “There is no reason to lie about a man’s record when it’s clear, it’s on paper and we all know it.”
Host Ed Henry asked if the “lie” she was referring to was coming from Obama or Trump. He noted what she said regarding the fact that Obama should get credit “in terms of pulling us out of the ditch.”
Henry then asked, “But isn’t President Trump’s point that now, over the last couple of years, it’s his cutting of taxes and regulation that has sustained that and pushed it forward?”
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“The way you just put it, that should be the tweet, not calling President Obama a con man,” Brazile said in response.
“Look, I recognize that President Trump, he doesn’t have a high opinion of Barack Obama, I do. I think most Americans have a high opinion of President Barack Obama, but let’s not tell a falsehood” she continued.
“Under Barack Obama this country came back. The country was ailing and I think we should all understand that by helping Wall Street, by helping the automobile industry, all the things that happened under his administration, we should celebrate it.”
“But guess what? We still have more work to do,” she added.
Obama and his allies have long touted the impact of the $787 billion economic stimulus package, also known as the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act. The measure was passed and signed in February 2009 — about 14 months after the recession began in December 2007 and about eight months before the national unemployment rate peaked at 10 percent in October 2009.
The stimulus package was controversial at the time considering the size and scope of it, and its impact remains a matter of dispute. Obama officials, though, routinely credited the legislation with helping set the economy back on track following the historic recession, and claim it established the groundwork for economic gains under Trump.
Under the Obama administration, the unemployment rate fell steadily after reaching a high of 10 percent early in his first term, but it has continued to fall under Trump. The unemployment rate is currently at the lowest it's been in the last five decades.
“Things started improving under President Obama,” Brazile said on Tuesday. “Look, Donald Trump inherited a great economy. Now he’s trying to make it better. I have no problem with that. I have no problem with the fact that black unemployment continues to go down, the fact that more women are working today, all those things that the president highlighted during his State of the Union, you know what I said, ‘thank you, thank you, thank you.’”
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“But then that was the end of my clapping, OK? Because we also have the largest deficit, we have got to continue to worry about trade deals, there are still millions of our fellow citizens who live on the outskirts of hope and we need to find ways to bring them back into the circle of opportunity,” she continued.
Fox News’ Brooke Singman contributed to this report.
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