Grocery prices are up, not ‘way down’ as Trump claimed

[Thiệu Ngô]

Newly released inflation figures show that President Donald Trump was wrong when he repeatedly claimed this month that grocery prices are “down” or “way down.”

By Daniel Dale

They were up, again, last month. And they have increased since the start of his presidency.

Average grocery prices rose 0.3% from August to September, according to Consumer Price Index figures released Friday. That increase followed a 0.6% jump from July to August, which was the biggest month-to-month jump in three years.

Average grocery prices in September were about 2.7% higher than they were a year prior and about 1.4% higher than they were in January, the month Trump returned to office.

The grocery price increases have been broad, spanning the vast majority of product categories tracked by the federal Bureau of Labor Statistics.

Prices in four of the six major grocery categories increased from August to September. The cereals and bakery products category was up 0.7%; the nonalcoholic beverages category was also up 0.7%; the meats, poultry, fish and eggs category was up 0.3%; the “other food at home” category was up 0.5%. The fruits and vegetables category was unchanged, while the dairy and related products category was down 0.5%.

Prices in all six categories have increased over the past year. Since September 2024, the nonalcoholic beverages category was up 5.3%; the meats, poultry, fish, and eggs category was up 5.2%; the “other food at home” category was up 1.9%; the cereals and bakery products category was up 1.6%; the fruits and vegetables category was up 1.3%; and the dairy and related products category was up 0.7%.

There have been particularly sharp increases since September 2024 in the prices of coffee (up 18.9%) and beef and veal (up 14.7%). Overall consumer prices are up 3.0% since September 2024.

Repeated false claims about grocery prices

Trump campaigned on  a promise to reduce grocery prices. Since returning to the White House, he has claimed over and over that he has actually done so – ignoring the federal data that shows he has not.

He continued to make such claims even after the September release of the previous Consumer Price Index report that showed the 0.6% increase in average grocery prices from July to August.

“Grocery prices are way down,” he said Tuesday.  “Groceries are down,” he said October 16. “Now, as you know, groceries are down,” he said October 14. “We’ve gotten prices way down for groceries,” he said October 10. “Under my leadership…grocery prices are down,” he told world leaders at the United Nations on September 23.

It’s normal for grocery prices to rise over time, as overall prices tend to do, and there is always a complicated mix of domestic and international factors at play. This year’s inflation in grocery prices is markedly lower than the 2022 spikes that followed Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, and it’s important to note that food prices can be volatile for reasons like severe weather, unexpected supply chain snarls and other temporary disruptions.

But food economists like Michigan State University professor David Ortega say two of Trump’s signature policies – tariffs on imported goods (including food) and a crackdown on undocumented immigrants (who make up a large percentage of the US farm workforce) – have clearly contributed to the increases in grocery prices this year.

“This uptick in food prices is consistent with what we would expect the effects of some of the administration’s policies to have on food,” Ortega said.

Ortega noted that there have been recent spikes in the average consumer prices of coffee and bananas, two products that are almost entirely imported in the US, as well as other grocery items sometimes subject to significant tariffs, including beef. “You can’t attribute all of” those price hikes to the tariffs, he said, “but I’m pretty confident in saying the tariffs and the current trade policy is contributing to these increases that we’re seeing.”