Trump’s spree of new project announcements in recent weeks mirrors the run-up to the 2018 midterms

President Trump has been appearing around the US in the run-up to the midterm elections, announcing economic development projects — from a possible pipeline in Alaska to a steel plant in Iowa to an aluminum smelter in Oklahoma — that he says will transform the country.

“In the real economy, we are blowing it away,” he said at a weekend stop in Tennessee.

Trump’s message of confidence comes as the ultimate shape of these projects remains far from certain and often directly echoes his pitch at this stage in the 2018 midterm elections, a Yahoo Finance review found.

That election eight years ago was the last time Trump faced midterm voters and also saw him tout projects — most notably a Foxconn electronics manufacturing plant planned for Wisconsin — that turned out to be less than advertised.

“FoxConn … had a ribbon-cutting a few months ago,” Trump said at a stop in Wisconsin on the eve of the 2018 election, pledging that the project was set to bring in “almost 15,000 jobs and there is no plant like it in the United States.”

But the company eventually scrapped much of its manufacturing plans at the site and shifted the focus to data centers. Today, it employs only a reported 1,200 people at the site.

The president’s penchant for promises is on display again as Election Day nears.

On Tuesday, he is set to travel to Alaska to tout a proposed $50 billion gas pipeline between South Korea and Alaska that could help Republican Sen. Dan Sullivan fend off a Democratic challenge.

Trump unveiled the project earlier this month in the Oval Office with Sullivan at his side, but South Korean officials immediately pushed back, saying no final investment decision has been made.

Korean President Lee Jae Myung even added that the deal will only proceed once the project’s “commercial viability is confirmed.”

Trump’s promises in recent weeks have also included a $4 billion aluminum processing plant in Oklahoma. But local opposition to that plan — citing possible toxic chemicals and rising electricity prices — has led the town’s mayor and a board of trustees to pause zoning approvals, leaving the fate of the project up in the air.

Even the project’s developers recently reported to the SEC that “to complete this project, we will need to obtain substantial additional financing, and there can be no assurance that such financing will be available.”

That didn’t slow Trump from saying earlier this month that it would be “the largest aluminum factory, perhaps in the world, and you’re going to make a fortune with it, lots of jobs, a lot of everything.”

A record of Trump overstating his own role

The 2018 campaign was also notable for Trump overstating his role in various projects.

In 2018, Trump often mentioned Apple’s plans to spend $350 billion in the US, which he said was happening “only” because of his tax cut.

“We are making some of the biggest and most important deals in our country’s history,” Trump posted on his then-Twitter account at the time.

Yet those claims were an inflation of Apple’s investment promises — which totaled about $55 billion for 2018 — and the company said at the time that they were made not just for tax reasons.

Apple has been adept at repackaging long-term investment promises for each administration, with overlapping pledges made during Trump’s first term, the Biden administration, and then again as Trump returned to office.

Trump has also focused on a recent announcement of plans for a new $15 billion steel plant in Iowa.

Iowa’s governor recently signed a bill to move forward with government incentives, but the steel plant’s ultimate fate still raises questions, especially given that one of its financiers previously filed for Chapter 11 protection.

Trump’s track record stretching back to 2018 has drawn skepticism about those plans. Iowa’s Democratic nominee for governor, Rob Sand, noted the benefits of a steel plant while also reportedly telling voters at one stop that they have reason to be skeptical of a promise “that gets rolled out right before an election.”

The example he pointed to? Foxconn.

Ben Werschkul is a Washington correspondent for Yahoo Finance.

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