A photo featuring Republican VP nominee JD Vance has sparked quite a buzz online, especially after it was shared alongside a newspaper headline praising low inflation rates.
Florida Congressman Dan Waltz took to X (formerly Twitter) on Thursday, posting a picture of himself and Vance aboard an airplane, playfully pointing at a Diet Mountain Dew bottle with a copy of The Wall Street Journal in view.
“Ready to campaign with my fellow Diet Mountain Dew fan @JDVance,” Waltz remarked in a tweet that amassed over 2.7 million views.
Quickly, social media users noticed that the newspaper’s main headline read “Inflation Hits Lowest Level Since 2021,” a detail that may dampen Vance’s and Trump’s ongoing economic critiques aimed at Vice President Kamala Harris.
“Great pic, guys! Quick question, what’s that headline say?” Wisconsin Congresswoman Gwen Moore chimed in.
“Happy to see Republicans share @KamalaHarris’s good news on inflation!” added Florida Congresswoman Debbie Wasserman Schultz.
Another user humorously noted, “JD Vance enjoys a celebratory Diet Mountain Dew after reading the Wall Street Journal headline that ‘Inflation Hits Lowest Level Since 2021.’ He can barely couch his excitement. That’s GREAT news!” while sharing a version of the photo focusing on the headline.
In response to Wasserman Schultz, Waltz highlighted a smaller article in the paper that read, “The Taliban Celebrate Third Year in Power,” suggesting that Harris “owns that debacle.”
U.S. inflation peaked at 9.1 percent in June 2022, the highest in decades. However, many economists attribute this spike to the fallout from the COVID-19 pandemic rather than the actions of President Biden or his team. Recent reports indicate that inflation has been on the decline, with the U.S. Labor Department announcing a year-over-year rate of 2.9 percent in July, the lowest since March 2021.
Despite these positive indicators, Trump and Vance persist in targeting Harris and her running mate, Tim Walz, claiming economic vulnerabilities for the Democrats.
Interestingly, a recent survey from Financial Times and the University of Michigan’s Ross School of Business revealed that voters trust the Democratic ticket with the economy more than Republicans for the first time in nearly a year.
On the same day, Trump held a press conference fixated on economics where David Axelrod, a former adviser to Obama, remarked that Trump’s demeanor resembled “a nervous breakdown in public.” Trump ominously warned of a potential stock market crash reminiscent of 1929 if he doesn’t win this November, a sentiment he also expressed before his 2020 election loss.