State of the Union Bingo

Mark squares as Trump's claims are delivered.

Click the image to get to the interactive bingo board

I always wanted to do something like this at The Washington Post but could never get buy-in from the top brass. Trump loves to repeat certain falsehoods, so an experienced Trump watcher can predict which claims are likely to appear in his State of the Union. Even if his staff doesn’t include them, Trump will ad-lib his favorites. So it was relatively easy to anticipate what he would say.

Click the link on the image or here, and it will take you to an interactive bingo board. Shuffle the claims before the speech and then mark them as they are delivered. Check a box as long asTrump’s language is in the ballpark (ie, the United States got $18 million in investments instead of “nearly $20 trillion” or factory construction is up 40 percent instead of “42 percent”). Trump is rarely consistent in the numbers he uses, so precision isn’t required.

If you get bingo, post the image on social media (#TrumpBingo) or on Substack and flag it to me. The first person to get bingo and post an image will earn a one-year paid subscription to this Substack.

Here’s a quick summary of what’s wrong with the 24 claims in the Bingo boxes.

I cut drug prices by 1000% — A mathematical impossibility. A 100% cut would be zero.

USA got nearly $20 trillion in investments — A laughable, made-up number.

I will pay down debt with tariffs — False. The money raised will barely make a dent in the budget deficit, which will soar because of Trump’s tax cut last year.

Foreign countries pay tariffs — False. Economists agree this is a tax that falls mainly on consumers. The Federal Reserve Bank of New York recently confirmed that 90 percent of the tariffs were paid by Americans.

Hamas got $50 million in condoms from USAID — False. Trump confuses Gaza, the Palestinian enclave on the Mediterranean, with the Gaza province of Mozambique in Africa — and USAID funding with Health and Human Services Department money given to the Elizabeth Glaser Pediatric AIDS Foundation for HIV/AIDS prevention.

We’ve ended weaponized government — Exactly the opposite. Trump has empowered the Justice Department to pursue vendettas of his foes.

The affordability crisis is over — Saying it over and over doesn’t make it so.

Don’t take Tylenol — Trump’s claim of an alleged link between Tylenol and autism is an appalling display of ignorance and hubris.

I’ve ended eight wars — This is poppycock. Few of these were wars, Trump’s role was often tangential, and the resolution of the conflicts is likely temporary.

Every boat blown up saves 25,000 lives. — A ridiculous claim. By Trump’s math, more than 500,000 American lives were supposedly saved by the Pentagon’s war on alleged Venezuelan drug boats, though the total number of U.S. overdose deaths was about 72,000 in the most recent 12-month period.

The best economy ever — Not by any measure.

Biggest tax cut ever — False. His 2022 tax cut ranks sixth, as a share of the economy, and his 2017 tax cut ranked eighth.

I’ve slashed trade deficit by 77% — False. In reality, the trade deficit fell only 0.2 percent in 2025.

We’ve earned trillions from tariffs — Nope, it’s less than $300 billion.

Stocks have soared since “Liberation Day” — Many foreign stock markets had better returns in the same period, so this is not a good bragging point.

Factory construction is up 42% — He’s taking credit for a spike that started in October 2021 under Joe Biden. According to the U.S. Census Bureau, spending on manufacturing construction has fallen 7 percent under Trump.

Now we have almost no inflation — Actually, it’s 2.4 percent.

I inherited the worst inflation in U.S. history — Nope, it was 3.0 percent in January 2025. Even the inflation peak of nearly 9 percent in 2022 was lower than during many other periods in Trump’s lifetime.

Tariffs have cut the budget deficit 27% — A cherry-picked figure that’s not reliable.

Gas is $1.99, compared to $5 a gallon when I took office — Nope. Gasoline prices are now about $2.93, compared to $3.12 in January a year ago, according to AAA.

I won the election three times — False. He lost in 2020, and then tried to overturn the result.

Illegal immigrants under Biden came from emptied prisons — A total fantasy, repeatedly debunked.

Biden allowed in 25 million people — False. This is inflated by four or five times.

Biden set free 11,888 immigrant murderers — An especially pernicious lie. This refers to people not detained by ICE, but they are in federal or state prisons. Trump had about the same number on the “undetained docket” during his first term.