(Bloomberg) — Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said he’s confident US consumer price increases will slow over the course of the year after a poll suggested Americans want President Donald Trump to focus more on bringing down inflation.
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Bessent defended Trump’s economic plans on CBS News’ Face the Nation, saying the president is seeking “a holistic approach that there will be tariffs, there will be cuts in regulation, there will be cheaper energy” over time.
He cited falling US home mortgage rates and a drop in yields on 10-year Treasuries — the bond “I am focused on” — as signals that inflation will return to the Federal Reserve’s target rate.
“I would expect that very quickly we will be down to the Fed’s 2% target,” Bessent said. “So I’m expecting inflation to continue dropping over the year.”
Bessent told Bloomberg Television on Friday that he sees the potential for inflation to return to the Fed’s 2% target “quickly.”
“Over the next six to 12 months, as we deregulate, drill more American energy” and bring certainty to extending the 2017 tax cuts, “we could very quickly go back to the Federal Reserve target of 2%,” he told Bloomberg Television’s David Westin.
Bessent was responding Sunday to data in a CBS News poll published Sunday. While 82% said inflation should be a high priority for Trump, only 29% said they think he is prioritizing it “a lot,” according to the poll.
The Feb. 26-28 poll of 2,311 people has a margin of error of plus or minus 2.5 percentage points.
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