Trump’s brags about drug prices are “mathematically impossible”
Washington, DC. Andrew Harnik/Getty Images
President Donald Trump claimed to be planning a massive reduction in drug costs for Americans, but critics were quick to point out his numbers don’t add up.
In a reception with members of Congress on Tuesday, Trump spoke about lowering drug prices for Americans at a time when cuts to programs like Medicaid are on the horizon.
In doing so, Trump promised some truly staggering figures.
“We will have reduced drug prices by 1000%, by 1,100%, 1,200%, 1,300%, 1,400%, 700%, 600%. Not 30% or 40% or 50%. But numbers likes of which you’ve never even dreamed of.”
“We’re gonna get the drug prices down,” Trump said. “Not 30% or 40%, which would be great. Not 50% or 60%. No, we’re gonna get them down 1,000%, 600%, 500%, 1,500%. Numbers that are not even thought to be achievable.”
Trump’s comments left social media users scratching their heads. Users asked X’s AI chatbot Grok about Trump’s claims. Grok variously called them “mathematically impossible,” “hyperbolic,” and in one case, “total BS.”
Several accounts pointed to the impossibility of “negative numbers” for drug prices, along with the idea of “getting paid to take drugs.”
One user put it more bluntly: “Cant wait fill my next zpack at cvs and leave with a stack of their money”
Trump claimed that an executive order signed in May would pave the way for reduced drug costs by invoking “most-favored nation” status on drug prices. In theory, pharmaceutical companies could not charge Americans anymore for drugs than they were charging citizens in other countries.
However, talks between the Trump administration and pharmaceutical companies have been ongoing, with one executive calling them “inconclusive” by according to Bio Pharma Dive.
In his first administration, Trump touted a war on drug prices in the wake of COVID-19, but failed to deliver on price reductions, with members of his own party referring to the idea as “socialist price controls.”
The post Trump’s brags about drug prices are “mathematically impossible” appeared first on Salon.com.
Yes, Trump is not very smart when it comes to math clearly. With that said, if he can bring the price of prescriptions down, it would be a good thing and I'm not going to poke fun at that.
Of course, like all things it will be better if he did it instead of talked about it.
Last edited by mgh888; 07/24/2511:52 AM.
The more things change the more they stay the same.
I'm all for it myself. But it's hard for me to resist pointing out that someone that calls himself "a very stable genius" has no concept of how percentages work. But that's usually how things play out when someone feels the need to brag on themselves.
I doubt it ever happens because you will always have the..........
Quote
members of his own party referring to the idea as “socialist price controls.”
You know how that works. We see it on this very board. Anything that helps all Americans ends up being labeled socialist and evil somehow. One even labels such things treasonous.
Intoducing for The Cleveland Browns, Quarterback Deshawn "The Predator" Watson. He will also be the one to choose your next head coach.
White House Slams ‘South Park’ Episode That Skewers Trump And Paramount Amid $1.5 Billion Streaming Deal, Skydance Merger ByConor Murray, Forbes Staff. Murray is a Forbes news reporter covering entertainment trends.
The White House slammed the “fourth-rate” Wednesday night season premiere episode of “South Park,” which took jabs at President Donald Trump and Paramount amid the company’s merger with Skydance, skewering the company over Stephen Colbert’s cancellation and Trump’s Jeffrey Epstein ties.
KEY FACTS
White House spokesperson Taylor Rogers told multiple outlets the show “hasn’t been relevant for over 20 years and is hanging on by a thread with uninspired ideas in a desperate attempt for attention,” accusing the left of “hypocrisy” for previously criticizing “‘South Park’ for what they labeled as ‘offense’ content, but suddenly they are praising the show.”
In the season 27 premiere of “South Park,” writer-producers Trey Parker and Matt Stone skewer Trump for using lawsuits to silence opponents, depicting the president suing the entire fictional town of South Park after residents oppose the government’s plan to push Christianity in schools.
The episode depicts Jesus Christ visiting South Park, which he says he had to do because of the “lawsuit and an agreement with Paramount”—an apparent reference to Trump’s now-settled lawsuit against the company—as Jesus asks the townspeople, “Do you really want to end up like Colbert?” referencing the late-night show’s cancellation.
In multiple scenes from the episode, the cartoon Trump jumps in bed with Satan, who is depicted as his lover and in one scene rebuffs Trump, telling him someone commented on his Instagram that Trump is “on the Epstein list.”
“The Epstein list? Are we still talking about that?” the cartoon Trump responds, telling Satan to “relax”—a jab at Trump amid a firestorm of controversy, which has even riled members of his own base, over the Justice Department’s refusal to release more documents related to Jeffrey Epstein, which reportedly include Trump’s name.
The episode knocks Trump multiple times by depicting him with comedically small genitals, which frustrates Satan and enrages Trump when a portrait artist paints him with small genitals.
The episode concludes on a faux Trump public service announcement—an apparent knock at CBS and Paramount, whom Trump claimed will give him airtime for PSAs as part of a settlement—in which a lifelike, apparently AI-generated Trump wanders the desert nude as a voiceover says his genitals are “teeny tiny, but his love for us is large.”
WHY IS THERE TENSION BETWEEN “SOUTH PARK” AND PARAMOUNT?
The new “South Park” episode arrives less than 48 hours after Paramount and the show’s creators signed a deal reportedly worth $1.5 billion, under which Parker and Stone’s Park County company will produce 50 episodes over five years, while the entire series will stream on Paramount+. “South Park” was previously available to stream on HBO Max until the series’ deal with the streaming service lapsed in June. The deal followed tense negotiations in which Park County’s lawyers accused Jeff Shell, a former NBCUniversal executive who is set to become Paramount’s president if its merger with Skydance completes, of interfering with Park County’s negotiations with other potential buyers including Netflix and Warner Bros. Discovery. Parker and Stone lashed out at Paramount in a statement on X earlier this month after the season 27 premiere was pushed back by two weeks. “This merger is a sh—tshow and it’s f—ing up ‘South Park.’ We are at the studio working on new episodes and we hope the fans get to see them somehow,” the creators said.
WHAT IS INCLUDED IN TRUMP’S SETTLEMENT WITH PARAMOUNT?
The “South Park” episode appeared to knock both Trump and Paramount, who earlier this month reached a settlement following Trump’s lawsuit against the company for allegedly modifying an interview with his former presidential opponent, former Vice President Kamala Harris. The lawsuit was settled as Paramount seeks approval from Trump’s Federal Communications Commission to approve the merger. As part of the $16 million settlement, Trump claimed in a post on Truth Social he will receive “$20 Million Dollars more from the new Owners, in Advertising, PSAs, or similar Programming.” In the “South Park” episode, the concluding satirical Trump advertisement is introduced as “Pro-Trump PSA, 1 of 50.”
TANGENT
The Wall Street Journal reported Wednesday Attorney General Pam Bondi previously told Trump at a meeting his name is included among many in files the Justice Department reviewed concerning Jeffrey Epstein. The White House claimed the report is a “fake news story.”
Exclusive: ‘A more vulnerable nation’: FEMA memos lay out risks of plan to cut $1B in disaster and security grants
The Federal Emergency Management Agency has proposed cutting nearly $1 billion in grant funding that communities and first responders nationwide use to better prepare for disasters and to bolster security for possible terror or cyberattacks.
The proposed cuts, which still require approval from the White House budget office and Congress, would zero out funding for more than half of FEMA’s emergency management and homeland security grant programs, according to internal memos and two FEMA officials familiar with the plans.
This comes amid an overhaul of the disaster relief agency at the hands of the Trump administration, which seeks to drastically shrink FEMA’s footprint and shift more responsibility for disaster preparedness, response and recovery onto states. The Department of Homeland Security, which oversees FEMA, has looked at slashing grant funding as part of that effort.
In one memo signed by acting FEMA Administrator David Richardson, the cuts are described as a way to “focus on appropriate spending for the Agency’s core mission in emergency management.”
But the memos – signed by Richardson and approved by Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem – also acknowledge in stark terms the potential risks of eliminating the programs.
The loss of one program that helps communities plan and train for disasters would “leave state and local governments more vulnerable to catastrophic incidents,” one memo states. Ending another that bolsters transportation infrastructure and terrorism protections would “contradict the administration’s commitment to a safer and more secure country,” the memo says.
Terminating the Urban Areas Security Initiative (UASI) – the largest FEMA program on the chopping block, providing more than $500 million to prepare major cities for catastrophic emergencies – would create “a less secure nation, especially at the border and in some of the nation’s most targeted cities, including Miami, Washington DC, and Dallas,” the memo states.
The agency also plans to eliminate funding for the Next Generation Warning System initiative, which is designed to modernize and improve the nation’s public alert and warning capabilities for severe storms and other emergencies, after pausing the program earlier this year.
According to the memo, FEMA staff had suggested that instead of terminating the program, the money could be allocated “to high-risk flooding areas including Texas and New Mexico.” But Richardson signed off on eliminating it earlier this month.
Among the other impacts from the potential cuts, as outlined by FEMA, would be “undertrained firefighters,” “poor wildfire readiness,” more risk at “120 critical United States ports” and less homeland security training for cities hosting World Cup games. Axing another program “could increase the risk of terror attacks on passenger rail,” the memo says, and cutting off a violence and terrorism prevention program “results in a more vulnerable nation.”
DHS said the memos referenced in this story are “cherry-picked,” but acknowledged the department is looking to cut “unaccountable programs.”
“Secretary Noem and this Administration are focused on ending waste, fraud, and abuse across the federal government - and FEMA is no exception,” a DHS spokesman said in a statement to CNN. “For years, taxpayer dollars have flowed to bloated grants, political pet projects, and groups with questionable ties. That ends now.”
This comes after FEMA shut down the Building Resilient Infrastructure and Communities program, halting more than $600 million intended to help communities prepare for natural disasters, prompting 20 states to sue the agency.
Due to the ongoing litigation, the memos state, FEMA will address the future of the BRIC program at a later date.
The cuts to disaster and security grants could have wide-ranging consequences for communities that depend on these funds. The National League of Cities, an advocacy group representing cities, towns and villages across the US, “strongly opposes” the proposed cuts, according to a statement provided to CNN by a spokesperson.
“Reducing or eliminating these programs would severely undermine the preparedness of our first responders and compromise the ability of local governments to effectively ensure the core capabilities necessary for prevention, protection, mitigation, response, and recovery efforts,” the NLC spokesperson wrote.
FEMA’S deadline to get funds out the door
Congress allocated a total of more than $4 billion this fiscal year for FEMA to support these national preparedness programs, which state and local governments, emergency management agencies, and fire and police departments depend on for essential staffing, equipment, and training.
But in recent months, the disaster relief agency, at the direction of DHS, has largely halted the selection of new grant recipients so it could review the programs.
That has left emergency managers across the country waiting for FEMA to issue Notices of Funding Opportunities, or NOFOs, which allow local jurisdictions and organizations to apply for grants and are now more than two months behind schedule.
“We’ve been ghosted by FEMA,” a North Carolina official recently told CNN, expressing frustration over the lack of guidance on whether states can expect funding in the coming months.
Now federal and state emergency managers are increasingly concerned that large portions of this year’s funds will go unspent, as the funding streams expire unless allocated by the end of September.
FEMA chief grilled on funding concerns
At a hearing on Capitol Hill Wednesday, Richardson told concerned lawmakers, “We’re getting the NOFOs out the door as we speak.” The acting FEMA chief did not mention the looming cuts he had authorized in the memo he signed days before the hearing, though he criticized the agency’s grant programs.
“A lot of the grants sound good, and then you dig into them, and they’re not so good,” Richardson said, citing resilience projects “used for things like bike paths and shade at bus stops.”
During Wednesday’s hearing, Rep. Dina Titus, a Nevada Democrat, pressed Richardson about the status of UASI funding, emphasizing its importance for protecting Las Vegas from potential terror threats.
Richardson responded: “What I can commit to is that we’ve been doing due diligence on all of the grants.” He did not mention the program’s potential termination.
Responding to CNN’s new reporting Thursday, Titus said the plan to cut UASI is “deeply irresponsible and endangers our public safety.”
“These grants played a significant role in the response to the Harvest Festival shootings and are critical to protecting the public in all major cities and at big events such as the Super Bowl, Formula One races, and golf tournaments,” Titus said in a statement to CNN.
“I implore Secretary Noem to administer these public safety grants as Congress directed and ensure that our first responders and emergency personnel have the tools they need to address future threats in our communities.”
14 GOP Senators Urge Trump Administration To Release NIH Research Funds
A group of 14 Republican senators on Friday pressed the Trump administration to disburse critical research funding for the National Institutes of Health that Congress approved earlier this year aimed at tackling cancer, cardiovascular disease and rare pediatric disorders.
“We are concerned by the slow disbursement rate of FY25 NIH funds, as it risks undermining critical research and the thousands of American jobs it supports," the senators wrote in a letter to the White House. "Suspension of these appropriated funds — whether formally withheld or functionally delayed — could threaten Americans’ ability to access better treatments and limit our nation’s leadership in biomedical science."
The letter was authored by Sen. Katie Britt of Alabama, where colleges stand to lose tens of millions of dollars in research funding as a result of the freeze. Several other notable Trump allies signed on, including Lindsey Graham and Tim Scott of South Carolina, Dave McCormick of Pennsylvania, and John Boozman of Arkansas.
FEMA to send states $608 million to build migrant detention centers
FEMA is starting a “detention support grant program” to cover the cost of states building temporary facilities, according to an agency announcement.
The Federal Emergency Management Agency is preparing to send $608 million to states to construct immigrant detention centers as part of the Trump administration’s push to expand capacity to hold migrants.
FEMA is starting a “detention support grant program” to cover the cost of states building temporary facilities, according to an agency announcement. States have until August 8 to apply for the funds, according to the post.
The Trump administration has been encouraging states to build their own facilities to detain migrants. This program provides a way for the administration to help states pay for it.
The funds will be distributed by FEMA in partnership with U.S. Customs and Border Protection, according to the post.
Florida Governor Ron DeSantis, a Republican, said on Friday morning that the state would apply for FEMA reimbursement to pay for its new immigrant detention center known as “Alligator Alcatraz.” DHS officials said this summer the facility will cost an estimated $450 million annually.
Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem has said DHS will tap FEMA’s $650-million shelter and services program to fund Florida’s facility. Congress during the Biden administration directed DHS to distribute the money to state and local governments to cover the cost of sheltering migrants. Nonprofits were also eligible. The funding stream was separate from money Congress set aside for FEMA to cover disaster relief.
FEMA declined to answer a question from Reuters about whether Florida would receive money from the detention fund.
Trump’s trip to Scotland as his new golf course opens blurs politics and the family’s business
EDINBURGH, Scotland (AP) — Lashed by cold winds and overlooking choppy, steel-gray North Sea waters, the breathtaking sand dunes of Scotland’s northeastern coast rank among Donald Trump’s favorite spots on earth.
“At some point, maybe in my very old age, I’ll go there and do the most beautiful thing you’ve ever seen,” Trump said in 2023, during his New York civil fraud trial, talking about his plans for future developments on his property in Balmedie, Aberdeenshire.
At 79 and back in the White House, Trump is making at least part of that pledge a reality, landing in Scotland on Friday as his family’s business prepares for the Aug. 13 opening of a new golf course bearing his name.
Trump will be in Scotland until Tuesday, and plans to talk trade with British Prime Minister Keir Starmer and European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen.
The Aberdeen area is already home to another of his courses, Trump International Scotland, and the Republican president is also visiting a Trump course near Turnberry, around 200 miles (320 kilometers) away on Scotland’s southwest coast. Trump said upon arrival on Friday evening that his son is “gonna cut a ribbon” for the new course during his trip. Eric Trump also went with his father to break ground on the project back in 2023.
Using a presidential overseas trip — with its sprawling entourage of advisers, White House and support staffers, Secret Service agents and reporters — to help show off Trump-brand golf destinations demonstrates how the president has become increasingly comfortable intermingling his governing pursuits with promoting his family’s business interests.
The White House has brushed off questions about potential conflicts of interest, arguing that Trump’s business success before he entered politics was a key to his appeal with voters.
White House spokesperson Taylor Rogers called the Scotland swing a “working trip.” But she added Trump “has built the best and most beautiful world-class golf courses anywhere in the world, which is why they continue to be used for prestigious tournaments and by the most elite players in the sport.”
Trump family’s new golf course has tee times for sale
Trump went to Scotland to play his Turnberry course during his first term in 2018 while en route to a meeting in Finland with Russian President Vladimir Putin. But this trip comes as the new golf course is already actively selling tee times.
“We’re at a point where the Trump administration is so intertwined with the Trump business that he doesn’t seem to see much of a difference,” said Jordan Libowitz, vice president for the ethics watchdog organization Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington. “It’s as if the White House were almost an arm of the Trump Organization.”
During his first term, the Trump Organization signed an ethics pact barring deals with foreign companies. An ethics frameworks for Trump’s second term allows them.
Trump’s assets are in a trust run by his children, who are also handling day-to-day operations of the Trump Organization while he’s in the White House. The company has inked many recent, lucrative foreign agreements involving golf courses, including plans to build luxury developments in Qatar and Vietnam, even as the administration negotiates tariff rates for those countries and around the globe.
Trump’s first Aberdeen course sparked legal battles
Trump’s existing Aberdeenshire course, meanwhile, has a history nearly as rocky as the area’s cliffs.
It has struggled to turn a profit and was found by Scottish conservation authorities to have partially destroyed nearby sand dunes. Trump’s company also was ordered to cover the Scottish government’s legal costs after the course unsuccessfully sued over the construction of a nearby wind farm, arguing in part that it hurt golfers’ views.
And the development was part of the massive civil case, which accused Trump of inflating his wealth to secure loans and make business deals.
Trump’s company’s initial plans for his first Aberdeen-area course called for a luxury hotel and nearby housing. His company received permission to build 500 houses, but Trump suggested he’d be allowed to build five times as many and borrowed against their values without actually building any homes, the lawsuit alleged.
Judge Arthur Engoron found Trump liable last year and ordered his company to pay $355 million in fines — a judgment that has grown with interest to more than $510 million as Trump appeals. Golfers-in-chief
Family financial interests aside, Trump isn’t the first sitting U.S. president to golf in Scotland. That was Dwight D. Eisenhower, who played in Turnberry in 1959. George W. Bush visited the famed course at Gleneagles in 2005 but didn’t play.
Many historians trace golf back to Scotland in the Middle Ages. Among the earliest known references to game was a Scottish Parliament resolution in 1457 that tried to ban it, along with soccer, because of fears both were distracting men from practicing archery — then considered vital to national defense.
The first U.S. president to golf regularly was William Howard Taft, who served from 1909 to 1913 and ignored warnings from his predecessor, Teddy Roosevelt, that playing too much would make it seem like he wasn’t working hard enough.
Woodrow Wilson played nearly every day but Sundays, and even had the Secret Service paint his golf balls red so he could practice in the snow, said Mike Trostel, director of the World Golf Hall of Fame.
Warren G. Harding trained his dog Laddie Boy to fetch golf balls while he practiced. Lyndon B. Johnson’s swing was sometimes described as looking like a man trying to kill a rattlesnake.
Bill Clinton, who liked to joke that he was the only president whose game improved while in office, restored a putting green on the White House’s South Lawn. It was originally installed by Eisenhower, who was such an avid user that he left cleat marks in the wooden floors of the Oval Office by the door leading out to it.
Bush stopped golfing after the start of the Iraq war in 2003 because of the optics. Barack Obama had a golf simulator installed in the White House that Trump upgraded during his first term, Trostel said.
John F. Kennedy largely hid his love of the game as president, but he played on Harvard’s golf team and nearly made a hole-in-one at California’s renowned Cypress Point Golf Club just before the 1960 Democratic National Convention.
“I’d say, between President Trump and President John F. Kennedy, those are two of the most skilled golfers we’ve had in the White House,” Trostel said.
Trump, Trostel said, has a handicap index — how many strokes above par a golfer is likely to score — of a very strong 2.5, though he’s not posted an official round with the U.S. Golf Association since 2021. That’s better than Joe Biden’s handicap of 6.7, which also might be outdated, and Obama, who once described his own handicap as an “honest 13.”
The White House described Trump as a championship-level golfer but said he plays with no handicap.
We see such things as concerts tours, soccer teams and other commercial enterprises being "sponsored by". But this is the first time I recall something like this......
Trump's Scottish Golf courses. Sponsored in part by American tax payers.
Intoducing for The Cleveland Browns, Quarterback Deshawn "The Predator" Watson. He will also be the one to choose your next head coach.
U.S. drilling rigs down for 12th time in 13 weeks, Baker Hughes says
The number of total oil and gas drilling rigs in the U.S. fell by 2 to 542, resuming their decline after last week's gain followed 11 consecutive weekly declines, Baker Hughes reported Friday in its latest survey.
Oil rigs dropped 7 to 415 this week, the lowest count since September 2021, while gas rigs added 5 to 122, their highest since August 2023, and the total rig count was down 47 rigs, or 8% below this time last year.
In Texas, the total rig count fell by 4 to 249, the lowest since October 2021; the total rig count in the Permian Basin - which also includes eastern New Mexico - fell by 3 to 260, the lowest since September 2021, and rigs in the Eagle Ford shale in south Texas shed 2 to 39, the lowest since October 2021.
It's quite remarkable how he routinely ventures to the four corners of the internet to find these things.
LOL - wasn't sure to put this in the political jokes thread - but since you've been spamming this thread and the Gabbard thread with these funny posts "from the four corners of the internet" I thought here would do.
The more things change the more they stay the same.
This is great news!!! Huge victory for the US and our economy.
There has not been any fact sheet sent out that I saw from the White House yet-but it isn't all good.
The EU is one of our largest trading partners-last year our imports had a 1.2% tariff-When this deal goes through, the tariffs on imports will be about 17.5%-Another tax on the American consumer.
And with the exports increasing the foreign sales of energy-I assume that he is mostly talking about LNG-With the deals made with Japan and the EU-Trump has already announced about 145% of our yearly LNG exports are already spoken for in (2) trade deals-Another thing that is great for the businesses that export-but not good for the consumer-With the requirements of AI and the infrastructure required to power the AI plants and data centers-the cost of natural gas in the US and then the cost of electricity is going to greatly increase-and probably rather quickly
But they love trump's self imposed tariff tax! But they won't admit that's exactly what it is. What it boils down to is he claims he's hurting other countries by inflicting it on us to pay more. It must be that new math everyone keeps talking about.
Somebody better start growing bananas, coffee and a lot of olives real soon. As of now we already import almost half of our fruits and vegetables. And also America grows about 5% of it's olive consumption. And some people pretend that toy and sock factories are going to just spring up everywhere! And that even if they do families struggling from paycheck to paycheck will be able to afford it.
But isn't that the way it works? They claim people working low level, low paying job shouldn't be paid more while trump purposefully sets out to raise prices on those very same people.
Intoducing for The Cleveland Browns, Quarterback Deshawn "The Predator" Watson. He will also be the one to choose your next head coach.
OMG Trump cheats at Golf !! LMAO. I think everyone who knows ANYTHING about Trump including the MAGA crowd would probably say they would expect that.... and then they would go on to defend that somehow by claiming it's coz he trying so so so hard.
What a giant douche canoe.
The more things change the more they stay the same.
The issue for me is they claim it's liberals that "need video evidence". When they'll argue with you like a bull in a China shop if you don't provide video evidence to them. Even then sometimes they'll defend it or as per usual around here, ignore it. Then one of them even made the foolish claim that he address topics with substance. While he has avoided them like the plague. Sometimes that presents quite the conundrum. Should I laugh at them or have pity for them? Getting angry about it is a waste of time and energy. I outgrew that long ago.
Intoducing for The Cleveland Browns, Quarterback Deshawn "The Predator" Watson. He will also be the one to choose your next head coach.
OMG Trump cheats at Golf !! LMAO. I think everyone who knows ANYTHING about Trump including the MAGA crowd would probably say they would expect that.... and then they would go on to defend that somehow by claiming it's coz he trying so so so hard.
What a giant douche canoe.
It's been reported that caddies at his golf resorts nicknamed him 'Pele' because of how often he was caught kicking his golf ball for a better lie.
OMG Trump cheats at Golf !! LMAO. I think everyone who knows ANYTHING about Trump including the MAGA crowd would probably say they would expect that.... and then they would go on to defend that somehow by claiming it's coz he trying so so so hard.
What a giant douche canoe.
It's been reported that caddies at his golf resorts nicknamed him 'Pele' because of how often he was caught kicking his golf ball for a better lie.
lmao
The GOAT!
"The tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time with the blood of patriots and tyrants." Thomas Jefferson.
