The latest Axios report on the economy starts with a sentence White House officials are probably not going to like: “Five weeks before the midterms, Americans’ pocketbook pain is getting worse: paychecks haven’t kept up with inflation for the better part of this year, and borrowing costs have surged.” A week earlier, The Wall Street Journal reported that the “misery index,” which combines the inflation and unemployment rates, is higher now than when Donald Trump’s second term began.

The list of relevant data points is not short: Fuel prices have increased sharply; mortgage rates have topped 7%; farmers are struggling; heating bills are climbing; and several national polls have made it painfully clear that the American mainstream is thoroughly dissatisfied with the economic status quo.

For a normal president, the circumstances warrant a deft touch: How does an incumbent carefully acknowledge public discontent, while offering reassurances about better days ahead?

For the current president, who’s anything but normal, it’s apparently time for a different strategy: Donald Trump wants Americans to believe him instead of their wallets.

On Sunday, for example, the president insisted that consumer prices on “almost” everything had “come way down,” which is ridiculous.

A day later, at a White House event, Trump kept going.

“We have the best economy we’ve ever had,” the Republican argued, reality be damned.

Later, at the same Oval Office gathering, the president appeared to point at members of the White House press corps and said, “You’re twice as wealthy as you were a short time ago, every one of you. And that’s because of me. Have a good time, everybody.”

And this, in a nutshell, is Trump’s message to the electorate as the early voting period gets underway in earnest: You think the economy is awful, and you think you’re struggling with an affordability crisis, but everything’s actually awesome.

The latest national CNN poll, released last week, found that 66% of Americans believe Trump’s agenda has “worsened economic conditions;” 28% describe current economic conditions as good; and just 27% of the public approves of the president’s handling of the economy.

Trump can keep lying to people about this being the single greatest economy ever seen by American eyes, but as a rule, telling voters not to believe their own wallets is a losing proposition.

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