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boards Air Force One, Aug. 7, 2026, at Joint Base Andrews, Md. (AP Photo/Julia Demaree Nikhinson, File)
A look at 'the buck stops'
somewhere
else...
WASHINGTON (AP)
It is among the most famous phrases in presidential history: Except with President Donald Trump, it almost never does.
Pithy slogans aside, all modern presidents shift responsibility onto others to some degree, frequently blaming the commander-in-chief who preceded them, Congress - or both.
But Trump has taken it to a new level, effectively embracing a de facto political strategy of,
Trump's tendency to point fingers at others is increasingly in the spotlight before November's midterm elections, when Republicans are trying to retain control of Congress.
His unwillingness to accept blame sometimes leads him to deny that there are problems at all, and could leave GOP leaders in tight races with little reassurance for voters that their concerns are being addressed.
The White House counters that Trump is working to correct long-festering challenges, not simply throwing up his hands and ignoring them.
The president is,
...spokesperson Taylor Rogers said, pointing to a series of policies that she said Republicans can run on, including,
Ducking responsibility dates to Trump's first term
Truman famously kept a "The Buck Stops Here" sign on his desk as president.
That came from "pass the buck," which, according to Truman's presidential library, dates to frontier times, when poker players would pass a buckhorn handle knife to the person whose turn it was to deal the cards.
The understanding of the phrase has broadened over the years to include taking responsibility for the outcome of tough decisions.
Trump used to espouse similar beliefs, saying back in 2013 that in running a business,
Accepting the 2016 presidential nomination, Trump said,
But as president, he has often suggested that the solution and blame rest elsewhere.
In 2020, on the same day he declared the coronavirus 'pandemia' a national emergency, he said,
Anslover said Truman took full responsibility for dropping atomic bombs on Japan even though he was not informed that the U.S. was developing such weapons until his predecessor, Franklin Delano Roosevelt, died.
John F. Kennedy saw his approval ratings rise after he acknowledged he was to blame for the failed Bay of Pigs invasion in Cuba.
Ronald Reagan said he was sorry for any involvement he may have had in the Iran-Contra scandal even while saying he wasn't sure he was to blame.
At his final news conference in early 2009, George W. Bush listed a series of mistakes he had made, including failing to find weapons of mass destruction in Iraq.
His successor, Barack Obama, said,
...after his nominee for health chief, Tom Daschle, withdrew because of unpaid back taxes.
Presidents before Trump,
The president acknowledged in a recent Punchbowl interview that voters are angry, but he said they are not mad at him but at congressional Republicans.
Trump believes his party can hold its congressional majorities after November, but he was clear that if Republicans lose, it won't be his fault - echoing his comments before the 2018 midterms that he would not accept blame if his party lost control of the House, which it did.
Trump's approval rating on the economy, once seen as among his strongest issues, has fallen throughout his time in office, from 40% in March 2025 to 32% in July, according to Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research polling.
About 6 in 10 U.S. adults say Trump's economic policies have made economic conditions worse, according to Pew Research Center polling.
Trump instead points to Biden, under whom inflation hit a four-decade peak of 9.1% in 2022 as the pandemic was still roiling the world economy, before declining to 2.7% by November 2024.
Last month, pressured by the Iran war, it was 3.4%.
Andrew Bates, a Democratic strategist and former Biden White House spokesperson, noted that Trump no longer mentions his campaign promise to "immediately end inflation" on Day One.
Trump has shown the same pattern with Iran and the 'Reflecting Pool'.
The president has characterized the Iran war as "a little excursion" or "detour."
To play down how long it has lasted, he frequently notes that U.S. wars in Vietnam and Afghanistan dragged on for years, though the Iran conflict - which he initially said would be over in four weeks to five weeks - is now in its sixth month with no clear end in sight.
Trump has sought to shift blame to the past on the Reflecting Pool, falsely suggesting that Biden and Obama spent "hundreds of millions of dollars" trying unsuccessfully to fix it.
But Trump's main defense has been,
And, so far, at least four cases alleging that, including the most prominent case against an Olympic canoeist, have been dropped because of a lack of evidence.
Nicole Anslover said that, after 11-plus years in politics, Trump has proved he is not afraid to violate norms of presidential comportment.
Lots of his core supporters do not seem bothered.
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