Transcript: Kevin Hassett on "Face the Nation with Margaret Brennan," Nov. 30, 2025

The following is the transcript of the interview with White House National Economic Council Director Kevin Hassett that aired on "Face the Nation with Margaret Brennan" on Nov. 30, 2025.

NANCY CORDES: We turn now to the Director of the White House National Economic Council, Kevin Hassett. Kevin, thanks so much for being with us.

KEVIN HASSETT, DIRECTOR NATIONAL ECONOMIC COUNCIL: Great to be here.

NANCY CORDES: So we've all eaten the turkey. Holiday shopping has begun in earnest. So let's talk about what the holiday shopping season looks like. We've got new surveys from Goldman Sachs and Bank of America that paint a modest picture of the holiday spending outlook. They say low and middle income Americans are planning to pull back a little bit because they perceive that prices are higher. And they say if spending is up this year, it's going to be because goods, in part, are more expensive. Is this the temporary result or long term result of the Trump tariffs?

HASSETT: Right. Well, what we've seen- those were reports about what people anticipated would happen over the Thanksgiving weekend, but we now have hard data for Black Friday and even for Saturday and the online sales were up almost 10%, in store sales were up 4%, it was really a blockbuster weekend after Thanksgiving. And so I think that the folks who are saying, wow, maybe people are going to be anxious about going back and getting presents for the kids and so on. They've been disproven this weekend. And I think the reason is that people- incomes are up this year. We had a great jobs report and with strong income and the government shut down over so that people presumably have a little pent up demand as well. I think that we're looking at a great recovery from a weak few weeks because of the shutdown.

NANCY CORDES: Sure. I'm wondering how much of that spending increase you think is attributable to the fact that prices are up. Let me give you an example. The maker of Tonka Trucks said a couple days ago that a toy truck that cost $30 last year is going to cost $40 this year, partly because they lost about eight weeks of shipping due to the U.S. trade war with China. What's your advice to holiday shoppers who don't want to spend more this year than they did last year, or can't afford to spend more?

HASSETT: Right. Well, as you know, it depends on what you're looking at. Like egg prices are down. Gasoline prices drop below $2 a gallon in a lot of places, mortgage rates are down--

NANCY CORDES: --you mean below- gas prices on average are still at $3 a gallon.

HASSETT: Yeah that's right for a few states they got below two. And so the point is just that- in the end, what matters is in the aggregate, the average across everything that everybody buys, and that averaged about 5% under Joe Biden, and is a little bit above two and a half percent- about cut in half for President Trump. And the bottom line, though, is really the wages have been growing faster than prices, and that's why real incomes this year are up by about $1,200 so far. That's why we could have a great Black Friday and a great Thanksgiving sales weekend because people feel like they have more money in their pockets. Even though you're right, there are some things that cost more, some things that cost less, but on average, we're about half the inflation rate of Joe Biden

NANCY CORDES: Polls show that the public, despite some of the data you're presenting, is getting more skeptical. In our latest CBS News poll, 68% of Americans said they believe that President Trump's policies are pushing grocery prices up. They're up about 1.4% year to date. And economic sentiment, the number of people who think the economy is good, has actually dropped six points since he took office. How do you explain that?

HASSETT: Well, first of all, you mentioned quite accurately, the 1.4% increase in grocery prices. I think the interesting thing about that is that that's way below the Fed's target of two for everything else, right? And so you'd have to concede that 1.4% is very, very low inflation. And so I think that the bottom line is that we've got the 'Big, Beautiful, Bill' cutting taxes on overtime, taxes for tips and so on, and all that money is going to start to be in people's pockets, and that's why they're optimistic about next year. Scott Bessent said last week that he's looking at first half of next year that could be in the 4% range. And the reason is that we passed the tax cuts in July, and so they didn't have time to change all the tax forms and everything. And so people are going to get really, really big refunds in the fall as well. And so we're really optimistic, and we think that the good news around Thanksgiving is a sign of something that's even stronger to come.

NANCY CORDES: You mentioned purchasing power. One thing that is going to affect purchasing power for 22 million Americans is the expiration of Obamacare premium subsidies. Last week, a funny situation. The White House floated this plan to extend the subsidies for two years, then you dropped the proposal, and then the President said on Air Force One, somebody said I wanted to extend it for two years. I don't want to extend it for two years. I'd rather not extend them at all. Was this a case of the right hand not talking to the left hand?

HASSETT: No, I think that people were talking to each other. But what happened as, you know, as a professional journalist, is that sometimes people leak pre-decisional things that are confidential and pre-decisional. And I think that somebody did that, and then it rolled back because it hadn't been through the whole process, but President Trump has been clear that he's very concerned about the cost of health care, and that's why we had $50 billion for rural hospitals in the 'Big, Beautiful, Bill,' why we tried to get $30 billion in for cost sharing. And the Democrats didn't like that. They had an alternative approach. And so I think that what we're going to see now, between now and Christmas, is that people are going to work- work this out, because we have a solution. The White House has a solution for cost- cost sharing, and the Democrats have an alternative. And, you know, people don't want for the few seniors that have really, really massive increases to see those. But don't forget, the vast majority of people in the Affordable Care Act are getting their insurance for less than $50 a month, and so- so while this is an issue that needs to be worked out, we don't want to cause panic for the folks who are worried that they're going to lose the thing that they have, it's really just the very, very high cost people who are closer to retirement age that have the problem.

NANCY CORDES: Bloomberg is reporting, as I'm sure you know, that you are now considered the front runner to replace Fed Reserve Chair Jay Powell when his term expires in the spring. Secretary Bessent, who is heading up this search, said he was holding final interviews this week. How did yours go?

HASSETT: You know, I am not sure that Bloomberg has the story right. I'm really honored to be amongst a group of really great candidates. The thing that I was most impressive about this week when that story leaked was that really, I think the news for markets was that President Trump is close to announcing a new person who is going to replace Jay Powell. And if you look at the market response to that, it was very, very positive. We had a great Treasury auction. Interest rates went down. And so I think that the American people could expect President Trump to pick somebody who's going to help them, you know, have cheaper car loans and easier access to mortgages at lower rates. And that's what we saw in the market response to the rumor about me, which, you know, is probably about as valuable as the rumor about the health care policy that we just talked about.

NANCY CORDES: Well, I guess we'll find out if they're right sooner rather than later, when we hear the president's decision. So for now, Director of the White House, National Economic Council, that's your title today. Kevin Hassett, thank you so much.

HASSETT: Thank you.

NANCY CORDES: And we'll be back in a moment.

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