Trump boasts about record bill-signings; it’s not true
Six months on the job, he’s well behind pace of Carter, others
WASHINGTON — To hear President Donald Trump tell it, his first six months in the White House should be judged in part by the legislation he has signed into law.
At rallies, in speeches and on Twitter, Trump repeatedly boasts of the bills he has signed — 42 as of this week. He has said no president has “passed more legislation,” conceding once this year that he trailed Franklin D. Roosevelt, who, he noted, “had a major Depression to handle.”
On Monday, he went even further, claiming to have bested all of his predecessors in turning bills into law.
“We’ve signed more bills — and I’m talking about through the legislature — than any president, ever,” Trump said at a “Made in America” event at the White House. “For a while, Harry Truman had us. And now, I think, we have everybody.”
Turning to Vice President Mike Pence, he added an aside about news media fact-checkers: “I better say ‘think’; otherwise they will give you a Pinocchio. And I don’t like Pinocchios.”
In fact, as he reaches six months in office today, Trump is slightly behind the lawmaking pace for the past six presidents, who as a group signed an average of 43 bills during the same period. And an analysis of the bills Trump signed shows that about half were minor and inconsequential, passed by Congress with little debate. Among recent presidents, both the total number of bills he signed and the legislation’s substance make Trump about average.
President Jimmy Carter signed 70 bills in the first six months, according to an analysis of bills signed by previous White House occupants. Bill Clinton signed 50. George W. Bush signed