00:00Mr. Are we talking to you as the Vice President or the Press Secretary?
00:04Mr. So I'm not Marco. I have not yet accepted any additional jobs.
00:09Though I guess the Fraud Task Force as my co-chair is my second additional job.
00:13It's funny, before I came out here, I was talking with the President in the Oval Office,
00:16and he said, be careful. I want you to do well, but if you do too well, I might make
00:22you the Press Secretary.
00:23So I've got to screw up a little bit because I'm busy enough as it is.
00:26But I'm very much up here as the Vice President of the United States.
00:28I do have a political one and then something a little bit more upbeat.
00:32Okay.
00:32But first...
00:32Politics could be upbeat.
00:34It could be upbeat. Peter?
00:37It's almost Labor Day. Labor Day is traditionally the real kickoff for campaign season.
00:44Midterm voters are looking for somebody to blame for high prices on things like gas, energy.
00:51Why shouldn't they blame Republicans?
00:53Well, I'd say a few things.
00:55First of all, if you look at how endemic inflation became during the Biden administration,
01:00and this is not to cast blame because I don't really care who's to blame for it.
01:05I care about how to fix it.
01:06And that's what we've been working to do.
01:07So inflation under the last administration hit a record high of about 9.5%.
01:13And it's funny, during the 2024 campaign, the President and I would say, this is the highest inflation in American
01:18history.
01:19And people would come back and say, no, no, no, it's not the highest inflation in American history.
01:22It's just the highest inflation in the last 60 or the last 48 years.
01:26It's like, well, that's still very, very bad.
01:27So what happened with that is that when prices get baked in like that, it takes a little bit of
01:33time for us to undo some of the damage.
01:35Now, you know, we have done a lot of things in order to build upon the great success of the
01:42first Trump administration and deliver wins for working people.
01:45No taxes on Social Security, no taxes on tips, no taxes on overtime.
01:50We've seen $19 trillion of new investment come into the country.
01:53But most of that is building new factories and new facilities.
01:56Those factories are being built.
01:57So if you're a construction worker, that's great.
01:59And obviously we love our construction workers.
02:01However, it takes time to build those factories and employ the rest of the workers.
02:05And then, of course, to make the stuff that's going to be made at those factories.
02:08So I guess my point is that because America's inflation problem wasn't created in a day,
02:14it was created by very bad policies of the Biden administration,
02:18trillions of dollars of new spending that was going more to fraudsters than it was to the American people.
02:22It takes a little bit of time to rebuild the foundation of America's middle class economy.
02:27I think we've made incredible strides.
02:29But our argument to the American people is, look, it's very simple.
02:32You don't even have to listen to what we say.
02:34Listen to what the Democrats have said.
02:36If you think that inflation is a problem, if you think affordability is a problem,
02:40number one, we're doing everything that we can to bring down prices.
02:44But what do the Democrats say?
02:45They say that they want to undo taxes.
02:48They want to increase taxes on Social Security and tips.
02:50If you're worried about affordability, how is the Democrats tax increase going to make your life more affordable?
02:55One of the things I'm most proud of that the president has done is Trump Rx.
03:00If you look, we have almost 800 medications now that are part of Trump Rx,
03:04the most significant reduction in prescription drug costs that we've seen in 60 years.
03:08And again, that's going to accelerate as this program actually gets implemented.
03:12The Democrats did nothing.
03:14So while they're out there bragging that they're going to reverse the very policies
03:19that are making some of these prescription drugs more affordable,
03:22we're saying we're going to double down on the policies that are going to make prescription drugs more affordable.
03:26So I think if you just listen to what the Democrats are saying,
03:30what they're telling you is that every inflation problem that you're worried about today,
03:35they're going to make worse and they're going to undo our very good efforts
03:39to try to bring down the inflation and to make that reduction in inflation sustainable.
