'Not How Numbers Work': Critics School Trump After Baffling New Claim
President Donald Trump is getting heat on social media for making a claim about cutting drug prices that’s essentially mathematically impossible.
Trump began promisingly enough with a complaint shared by Democrats and Republicans alike: the high cost of medication, and how much more Americans pay for some medications than patients in other countries.
He promised to reduce those costs ― but to a very unlikely degree.
“We’re gonna get the drug prices down. Not 30% or 40%, which would be great. Not 50% or 60%. No, we’re gonna get them down 1,000%, 600%, 500%, 1,500%,” Trump said at a Republican dinner. “Numbers that are not even thought to be achievable.”
Critics quickly pointed out the reason those numbers are not thought to be achievable: reducing the price by 100% would make the drugs free. Reducing it by “1,000%, 600%, 500%, 1,500%,” as Trump said, would make the cost negative dollars ― with the drug company essentially paying people to take the medication.
Several users asked Grok, the AI chatbot on X, if Trump’s numbers made sense. Grok called Trump’s claim “mathematically impossible,” “hyperbolic and not literal” and “© HuffPost
