As US President Donald Trump hits the campaign trail in the final sprint to the midterm elections, he is launching an emphatic defence of America's economic performance, trying — as he often does — to bend reality to his will. This was reported by Qazaqyia.kz citing BBC News.

"We have the best economic numbers of any president in the history of our country, and yet people don't know about it because the press won't talk about it," he said last week.

While some economic indicators, including roaring stock market indexes and low US poverty rates, are indeed historic, the overall picture is not nearly as rosy.

Trump is often dismissive of concerns about affordability and the high cost of living in the US, describing them as "fake" and a Democrat-inspired "hoax".

The American public, however, sees it differently — and some key economic indicators provide ample evidence for their discontent. Inflation remains high at 3.4%, outpacing wage growth. The average cost of petrol has soared to $4.37 (£3.30) a gallon and beef prices are at a record high.

According to a YouGov survey, 63% of respondents believe the economy is "getting worse". An AP/NORC poll released last week found just 17% of adult Americans approve of the president's handling of cost-of-living issues, while 26% approve of his handling of the economy overall.

Those polls also suggest that many of Trump's policies, including tariffs, aggressive immigration enforcement and the ongoing conflict with Iran, are widely unpopular.

"We ask our voters their motivation to turn out, and what we find is cost of living, cost of living, cost of living," said Avery James, the director of communications at the Republican-aligned polling company Echelon Insights. "That's the top issue."

That has left Republicans running for office in the Congressional elections on 3 November with an agonising choice — should they be distancing themselves from Trump?

Their fear is that by echoing his sunny outlook they risk losing a number of electoral races that are currently projected to be very tight. But they also know that being seen to break with the president on the state of the economy is far from consequence free.

There are few Republican politicians as loyal to the president as Floridian House Congressman Byron Donalds. And there are few US states as traditionally hospitable to Republicans as Florida.

But even in the president's adopted home, which he carried in each of his three elections and which hasn't had a Democratic governor since 1999, candidates like Donalds are finding themselves having to adapt their pro-Republican messaging to acknowledge economic concerns.

Donalds — who stood by Trump as he fought his way back to power after his 2020 election defeat and took a prominent role in his 2024 election campaign — is now running for governor of Florida, with Trump's encouragement and enthusiastic endorsement.

When I saw him at a Hispanic church in Kissimmee, he was preaching to the proverbial choir — but pitching his message with a nod to the fact that for many money is currently tight.

"We're the best state in America," he said before acknowledging: "But success has gotten expensive."

He ticked through a laundry list of Florida constituents – retirees, teachers, emergency workers, restaurant staff and local government employees, flagging that they need to be able to "make ends meet".

In his stump speech, Donalds didn't mention Trump at all. He leaned heavily into stories of his own financial hardship during his younger years, of living paycheque to paycheque and waiting tables at the traditional southern style restaurant chain Cracker Barrel.

When he invited audience questions, there were the usual cultural hot-button topics, like the perceived threat of Sharia law in America, transgender athletes in women's sports and youth crime in public spaces.

But his supporters also wanted to talk about the high cost of housing — insurance, taxes, mortgage rates and home-owner fees — and healthcare worker shortages.

Trump may have mocked the term affordability, but Donalds – who is criss-crossing the state on an "affordability tour" – isn't the only Republican candidate talking about high prices.

It was a similar track at a campaign event in a Tampa seafood market the next day, when Bryan Avila, who is running for lieutenant governor on the same ticket as Donalds, took questions on energy prices and data centre construction.

"Everything is going up in prices, from food to even books for people going to college," said John Carroll, who serves on a Florida county housing commission. "It's a challenge no matter which party is in power, but here in Florida it's been Republican for so long."

Meanwhile in Texas, Governor Greg Abbott last month went to Texarkana to host a "rural affordability roundtable".

"We must lower costs for Texans in every corner of our state, and with my affordability agenda we will help make Texas the most affordable state in America."

And in Iowa, Ashley Hinson, a Republican congresswoman running for Senate, unveiled her own "affordability agenda".