Surrounded by boxes of Wheaties and Froot Loops, loaves of Wonder Bread, and packages of raw meat warming in the afternoon August sun last year, Donald Trump slammed what he called an “economic calamity” brought by his predecessor — and pledged to drive down the cost of everyday goods the day he took office.

“When I win, I will immediately bring prices down, starting on Day 1,” Trump said to reporters outside his golf club in Bedminster, New Jersey. He also vowed to “reduce energy and electricity prices by at least half within a 12-month period.”

But the cost of many of the products on that table have remained stubbornly high in Trump’s first seven weeks in office, while all three major stock market indexes have dropped below their Election Day levels amid concerns about the president’s aggressive tariff policies.

After the “shock and awe” of Trump’s initial weeks threw his political opponents off balance, the question of whether Trump can fulfill his economic promises has dismayed some of the voters who helped expand his coalition. While many of his supporters continue to put their faith in the president despite the economic forecasts, Trump’s broader popularity has started to drop, and his political capital could be tested if the economy suffers in the coming months. Republicans on Capitol Hill, under pressure to pass Trump’s agenda, must also work to maintain control of Congress during next year’s elections.

“It’s very clear that people voted for him to juice the economy, lower inflation, stop illegal immigration and get away from woke culture,” said Whit Ayres, a longtime Republican pollster. “If you look at what’s dominating the news these days, it tends to be massive cuts in federal employment and Ukraine and a plunging stock market.

“When people expect you to do one set of things when they vote for you, and then if the news tends to be dominated by another set, it leads to a good deal of disappointment.”

Voters largely put Trump in the White House over frustration with the economy, after Trump and Republicans argued that President Joe Biden’s policies sparked runaway inflation. Trump offered himself as the antidote, pledging to be effective as soon as he took the oath of office. But as his administration passes Day 52, the stock market has taken a dive, prices of many everyday goods have stayed high, and Trump and his allies have encouraged increasingly wary Americans to be patient as he vows to reshape the U.S. economy and boost manufacturing through tariffs on foreign goods.

The Trump administration has touted incremental economic gains in recent days, such as inflation easing more than expected in February. But Trump has cautioned that there will be a “period of transition” as he enacts his tariff policies, though neither he nor his advisers have spelled out how long Americans would have to wait for financial relief.

“That’s a good question,” a White House official replied to The Washington Post this week, when asked how long such a “transition” would go on.

Alexis Arney is not sure her growing family has time to be patient.

The former veterinary assistant and new mother from Locust, North Carolina, considers herself a feminist whose politics lean left. But she voted for Trump in November, hoping for a better economic outlook. She and her fiancé recently closed on a house and plan to move in this month with their 4-month-old daughter.

Two months into Trump’s second term, however, looking at a growing pile of bills, Arney said she feels “bamboozled” about what the president promised to deliver. Gas and grocery prices have gone up in her town just east of Charlotte. She said she may have to put her baby in day care and get a job to help cover the mortgage and bills.

Adding to her anxiety are fears that Trump and his Republican Party will cut food stamps and other entitlements, eliminating an option Arney’s family could turn to if things get worse. Her daughter drinks special formula to help with acid reflux.

“It’s $44 a can, and she’s going through seven cans a month,” she said. “I’m worried about being able to feed my baby.”

So far, she said, the Trump administration hasn’t done anything that would merit her putting her fears aside or trusting their process.

The president and his White House advisers have acknowledged the country’s worrying economic outlook, with Trump himself not ruling out that a recession is possible this year. But they have also sought to minimize consumer concerns about continued high prices, citing U.S. manufacturing projects that have been announced since Trump retook office.

“Shut Up About Egg Prices,” read the title of an op-ed Trump shared on social media in recent days, cautioning that Trump’s economic goals will take time. The piece by conservative commentator Charlie Kirk touted Trump’s Day 1 executive order to have his economic adviser issue a report by Feb. 19 on how agencies are working to reduce the cost of living — a task the administration has yet to fulfill.

Still, it’s unclear what political cost Trump could pay. Despite polling showing that more than half of Americans disapprove of how Trump is handling the economy, people who voted for Trump in 2024 still give him high marks on it. In a potential warning sign, even a majority of Republicans say they’re concerned tariffs will raise the cost of products they buy, according to a recent Washington Post poll.

Asked Tuesday whether Trump bore any responsibility for the fall in the stock markets, his press secretary, Karoline Leavitt, said he stands by his “commitment to restore American manufacturing and global dominance” through tariffs.

“The president wants the American people to have so much more money in their pockets they don’t know what to do with it,” Leavitt said. “That’s the goal of this administration. Through tariffs, through tax cuts, through deregulation and through unleashing the potential of our energy industry.”

Tom Kristunas, a 65-year-old Trump voter from Tunkhannock, Pennsylvania, said he hasn’t seen grocery prices inch down, but the country is “going in the right direction” with Trump at the helm. He said he didn’t expect to see prices drop this quickly anyway.

“I think it’s going to take a while,” said Kristunas, who retired from Procter & Gamble’s diaper factory in Northeastern Pennsylvania, a part of the state where Trump saw large gains with working-class voters. “It’s not going to happen overnight.”

The price of electricity surged throughout the winter, a blow to people like him who he said were “still reeling from what happened the last term.” Already, Kristunas said, gas prices have started to fall in his area — recently getting as low as $2.79 a gallon.

Many of the president’s supporters have given the same refrain when asked about the economy: Give him time.

“He’s just getting started,” 72-year-old Sandi Fitch said outside a Walmart in Menomonie, Wisconsin.

“Inflation still sucks,” 40-year-old Jon Haag said while shopping at Aldi in nearby Eau Claire. But “Trump’s been in power for, like, two minutes,” he added.

Bill Schroeder, a farmer on the Wisconsin-Minnesota border, conceded Trump’s tariffs may hurt his business in the short run. U.S. farmers get the vast majority of their supply of a key fertilizer ingredient from Canada, and plenty of people are worried about retaliatory tariffs on the cheese, corn and soybeans they export abroad. But Schroeder said he remembers how the first Trump administration gave billions of dollars to farmers who lost income in its trade war.

“He kind of took care of us,” Schroeder said.

Azaliya Odarchuk, a 19-year-old in Charlotte, cast her first-ever ballot in November and voted for Trump. She, too, said she hasn’t noticed any change in prices since Biden left office.

Odarchuk said she knows of other young people who don’t like Trump but still voted for him based on the economy. “I saw it on social media,” she said. “They said they were just tired of paying so much for everything.”

Trump ultimately must bring down the cost of goods to deliver on promises that swayed many of his new voters, she said — even if prices go up first and even if a recession takes place.

She disagrees with some of Trump’s positions — largely on foreign policy — but still thinks he will make good on his promise to restore the economy to where it was in his first term.

“I think Trump will get the prices down — I believe that he will,” Odarchuk said. “I don’t know the right way I would have gone about it, but I’m not president.”

Hannah Knowles, Isaac Arnsdorf and Emily Guskin contributed to this report.