1. United States
2. Ohio
3. Letter

A review of nearly 170 items tracked by the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) indicates that seven in ten have seen prices increase since January. Trump has gone from being the guy outside the system complaining about things getting worse to being the guy in charge and getting blamed for still-rising costs. What hasn’t changed for Trump, though, is that he’s still the guy who likes to slather buildings in gold and visit his private clubs and resorts (which he’s done on 123 of the 340 days of his second term, as of December 23). He’s the guy spending hundreds of millions of dollars to build a ballroom at the executive mansion, while the price of ground beef skyrockets. Beef is one of the categories that’s seen the highest price increases since January, according to consumer price index data for urban areas through November (the most recent date available). Some of the other largest increases are in the costs of tax preparation, the price of jewelry and the prices of audio equipment and coffee. The prices of those items serve as a reminder of another way in which Trump is poorly positioned to talk about tackling inflation: Some of these surges in costs are directly downstream from the tariffs Trump imposed on imports.