Trump lists 25 top achievements: What matters most To Americans

President Donald Trump posted a list of 25 claimed achievements to his Truth Social platform on Friday, presenting them as the record of what he called his “term three” ahead of the midterms.

Trump’s asserted policy wins range from taxes and employment to immigration, military operations and restrictions on diversity and transgender policies.

Among his stated accomplishments were tighter border controls, tax cuts, tariffs to support U.S. manufacturing, increased military spending, lower prescription-drug prices and a series of foreign policy and socially conservative measures.

But recent national polling shows voters judging Washington chiefly through the cost of everyday life, rather than the full range of policies Trump chose to highlight.

A Fox News poll conducted September 11 to 14 found 34 percent of registered voters named inflation or the cost of living as the country’s most important issue and 14 percent chose the economy or jobs, while a Marquette Law School Poll conducted September 2 to 9 produced a similar result among U.S. adults, with 37 percent choosing inflation and 16 percent the economy.

Households feeling pressure from prices, jobs, health care and retirement costs are therefore more central to the electoral argument than voters motivated principally by cultural disputes or foreign policy.

Newsweek contacted the White House for further comment on Saturday morning outside of regular working hours.

Key Points

• Trump’s list of claims can be broadly grouped around immigration, the economy, foreign policy, crime and public safety, and socially conservative cultural issues.
• Yet two September polls suggest the achievements most likely to resonate are those voters can connect directly to household finances, while immigration retains importance without approaching affordability as the leading concern.
• Economic claims occupy five places on Trump’s list, giving Republicans several ways to argue that the administration has improved prosperity.
• Immigration appears prominently on Trump’s list, but both surveys rank it well below pocketbook pressures.
• Foreign conflict attracts measurable concern among Americans, particularly in the Marquette survey, although Trump framed military action as success rather than unfinished risk.
• Crime and cultural policy appear to have a smaller national constituency when respondents must choose only one overriding issue, despite both featuring heavily in Trump’s list of successes.
• Issue importance is not the same as support for a policy, so low salience should not be read as public approval or opposition.

What To Know

The clearest message from both polls is that voters are looking first at their wallets.

A September Fox News poll conducted among 1,211 registered voters, with a margin of error of plus or minus 3 percentage points, found roughly three in ten naming the cost of living or inflation as the country’s most important issue.

And roughly one in seven chose the economy or jobs, the second most important issue named in the survey.

Immigration followed at eight percent, while crime, taxes, tariffs, foreign policy, national security and Social Security each drew two percent or less.

Marquette Law School reached a similar conclusion with a differently worded question and a different population.

Its September 2 to 9 national survey of 1,023 adults, with a margin of error of plus or minus 3.3 percentage points, found nearly four in ten selecting inflation and the cost of living.

One in six chose the economy, 10 percent cited the war involving Iran, Israel and the United States, and nine percent named Medicare and Social Security.

Immigration and border security stood at six percent, with crime at three percent.

Those findings make Trump’s tax, investment, employment, export and prescription-drug assertions the most electorally relevant part of his Truth Social post.

That does not establish that voters accept the claims, or that the policies have produced the effects described.

It shows only that these subjects overlap most closely with what respondents say matters.

Republicans Poll Strongly on Immigration

Immigration remains a meaningful Republican strength.

Marquette found adults preferred the Republican Party over the Democratic Party on immigration and border security by 42 percent to 31 percent.

Republicans also led on crime, 38 percent to 23 percent. Democrats, however, held advantages on the economy, inflation, Medicare and Social Security, and health care.

That creates the central political tension.

Trump devoted substantial space to areas where Republicans retain an advantage, but the biggest voter concern lies in a field where the same poll gave Democrats the edge.

Marquette also measured Trump’s approval at 19 percent on inflation and the cost of living, compared with 49 percent on border security.

Cultural claims involving diversity programs, transgender policy, school curricula and English as the official language may energize parts of Trump’s coalition.

Neither poll, however, ranked those subjects among the leading concerns given.

Their electoral value is more likely to depend on turnout and intensity within particular groups than broad national salience.

Any comparison requires caution.

Fox surveyed registered voters, while Marquette’s issue-priority result covered adults.

Each poll captured opinion during a short period, and a respondent naming one top issue may still care strongly about several others.

Full List Of ‘Top 25 Trump Achievements’

Trump described the following as achievements.

Newsweek has not independently verified the claims in this list and is presenting them as stated by Trump:

1. Securing the border and recording no illegal entries for 16 months.
2. Enacting the Laken Riley Act.
3. Producing a historic fall in the murder rate.
4. Delivering tax cuts, including exemptions for tips, overtime and Social Security.
5. Securing $19.2 trillion in investment commitments.
6. Imposing tariffs on metals and automobiles.
7. Overseeing 80 stock-market record highs since the election.
8. Reaching record employment.
9. Making record military investments.
10. Capturing Venezuelan leader Nicolás Maduro.
11. Destroying Iran’s nuclear-enrichment capacity.
12. Striking cartels and reducing fentanyl flows by 60 percent.
13. Negotiating prescription-drug price agreements.
14. Reversing climate policies and expanding drilling.
15. Ending electric-vehicle requirements and related regulations.
16. Putting goods exports on course for $2.5 trillion.
17. Abolishing diversity, equity and inclusion policies.
18. Restricting some group’s participation in women’s sports.
19. Restricting transgender-related teaching and critical race theory in schools.
20. Creating tax-free “Trump Accounts” with $1,000 for newborns.
21. Settling eight wars, including the Gaza conflict.
22. Securing the return of hostages, living and deceased.
23. Halting refugee admissions.
24. Deploying the National Guard to three cities.
25. Making English the official language.

What Happens Next

The list may supply Republicans with campaign talking points across almost every major policy field.

But polling indicates that its political test will be much simpler: whether voters believe life has become more affordable before they cast their midterm ballots.

Contact Newsweek editor on this story: Edward Pearcey.