House Speaker Nancy Pelosi is taking heat from the man who held her position over 20 years ago for knocking President Trump’s economy.
It was reported earlier this week that Pelosi has encouraged House Democrats in pro-Trump districts to adopt the strategy of convincing voters that the Trump economy is not as strong as the president claims. However, former Speaker of the House Newt Gingrich believes the economy is not at the top of the list of issues Democrats should be focused on.
“This is like picking a granite mountain and running head-on into it with your head,” Gingrich, who led the chamber from 1995-1999, told Fox News on Wednesday. “Anybody who thinks tearing up the State of the Union is clever, I think, is really deeply out of touch with reality, and this new attack on the economy will be the same.
“They could have a good fight on healthcare. That makes some sense. They could have a good fight on education reform,” the former Republican congressman from Georgia continued. “But to go after President Trump in what has been a remarkable period where … something like 65% of all Americans feel like they have more money, they are better off.
“To run in and say to them, ‘No, you’re too stupid to understand how bad the economy is’ doesn’t strike me as very good salesmanship,” Gingrich said, adding that going after Trump on the economy is a “whacked” idea.
A recent Gallup poll showed that 61% of people consider themselves “better off’ than they were three years ago when Trump beat Hillary Clinton in the 2016 election. Furthermore, more people give Trump credit for the current strength of the economy than former President Barack Obama, according to another poll released earlier this month showing that economic optimism has reached a 44-year high.
