CHICAGO — Outside of the Democratic National Convention, protesters and supporters alike are raging over abortion, Gaza, pronouns, vibes, and joy, but in the Trump International Hotel and Tower overlooking the Chicago River, allies of the eponymous former president and current Republican presidential nominee have honed in on the kitchen table issue of the worst inflationary crisis in 40 years.
Making the case for Donald Trump‘s candidacy, Sens. Rick Scott (R-FL) and Ron Johnson (R-WI) blasted Vice President Kamala Harris for embracing price controls as her proposed solution to the inflation unfurled during the Biden-Harris administration and branded the party’s “coup” to successfully oust President Joe Biden.
“Wages haven’t even come close to staying up with inflation, and her idea of price controls have never worked anywhere,” said Scott, who equated Harris with the communist dictators Hugo Chavez and Nicolas Maduro. “Socialism is death, destruction, and shortages, and that’s exactly what will happen if Harris gets elected.”
At the first of five daily press conferences to counterbalance the DNC across town, Johnson further warned that “Venezuelans voted themselves into poverty,” and that with Harris’s price control proposal, Americans stand on the cusp of doing the same.
“What I’m calling on the American press — who has unfortunately given Biden a pass, letting him campaign from his basement,” said Johnson, “the American people need to understand what Harris is proposing.”
In her prior bid for the Democratic nomination in 2020, Harris backed the Green New Deal, “Medicare for all,” and abolishing private health insurance and fracking before reversing course. She went on to withdraw from the primary before the Iowa caucuses, meaning that Harris has not been listed on a Democratic presidential primary ballot in either 2020 or 2024.
“She did not get one vote in the primary. This is a coup, and they are going to formally kick the president to the side tonight,” Johnson said of Biden, who is set to pass the torch to Harris tonight on the opening night of the convention. “And they’re going to call this defending democracy?”
Flanking Scott and Johnson were posters lamenting that prices for eggs since the start of Biden’s presidency and Harris’s vice presidency are up nearly 50% and elementary school lunches up a staggering 65.5%.
Although average overall inflation is up more than 19% for the nation as a whole, the phenomenon, almost always regressive, has hit different states and lower social strata much harder. In Johnson’s Wisconsin, the consumer price index has risen by 20.5%, and in Scott’s Florida, prices are up 21.7%, more than three times the Federal Reserve’s annual inflation target of 2%.
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Although Harris has seen somewhat of a honeymoon in the polls since the party installed her at the top of the ticket last month, her surge has stalled, a sign that the Trump campaign sees as part of the plan.
“It’s clear that Democrats think the best strategy is to keep Harris and Walz away from you all; we stand here in stark contrast to that,” said Brian Hughes, a senior adviser to the Trump campaign. “We believe based on the polling that the plateau has been reached.”