Juneteenth Is a Celebration of Freedom. Trump’s Economy Is Holding Black Families Back.
Juneteenth Is a Celebration of Freedom. Trump's Economy Is Holding Black Families Back.
Black families already face higher costs and less access as Trump dismantles federal protections meant to level playing field
Trump’s second term in office has been a series of betrayals to working families. The impacts of his economic mismanagement are being felt most acutely by Black Americans, who face higher unemployment than any other racial group in addition to steep cost pressures. At the same time, the president is willfully dismantling federal protections designed to help level the playing field and expand economic opportunity for Black families. Groundwork Collaborative analyzed some of the economic harms Black Americans face as a result of the Trump administration’s reckless agenda.
Groundwork’s Chief Economist, Breyon Williams, shared the following reaction to the analysis:
“Juneteeth is a celebration of freedom, honoring how far Black Americans have come and acknowledging how far there is still to go. Unfortunately, Black families still face steep longstanding barriers. Trump is actively worsening an already uneven playing field, gutting crucial protections and implementing policies that have left many Black Americans struggling with higher prices and fewer opportunities.”
Black families already face higher costs and less access, and the Trump administration is dismantling the protections meant to level the field.
- Inflation: Black families are among the hardest hit by inflation. Prices rose 4.2% over the past year in May, the highest annual price increases since April 2023, driven by Trump’s war in Iran. Black households feel these price hikes more because they spend a larger share of their budgets on essentials whose prices have skyrocketed, including 43% more on energy costs than white households.
- Housing: Buying a home is more difficult for Black families. The mortgage denial rate for Black applicants is more than twice as large as it is for white applicants. Trump signed an executive order in April 2025 directing agencies to stop enforcing the main law prohibiting lending discrimination.
- Lending: Minority borrowers, including Black borrowers, pay about $410 more in interest than white borrowers on a typical auto loan, even with similar credit scores and lower default rates. Trump’s gutting of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB), the agency tasked with policing auto lending, threatens to worsen the gap.
- Medical debt: Medical debt weighs more heavily on Black families. Nearly 25% of Black borrowers had medical debt in collections on their credit report in 2022, the highest of any racial group and nearly double the rate of white borrowers. A 2025 CFPB rule would have erased that debt from credit reports, but the Trump administration let it be struck down and then moved to prohibit states from keeping medical debt off credit reports.
- Banking: Black adults are disproportionately hit by overdraft bank fees. Black adults are more than twice as likely to get hit with overdraft fees as white adults. Trump signed a repeal of the CFPB rule that would have capped overdraft fees at $5.
- Wealth: Black families have the lowest wealth of any group. The median wealth of Black families stood at $44,900 in 2022, below Hispanic ($61,600), White ($285,000) and Asian families ($536,000). Trump’s tax law passed in 2025 disproportionately benefits wealthier households, expected to further widen wealth inequality, including the racial wealth gap.
Black workers fare worse under Trump.
- Black workers are being left behind in the labor market. Black unemployment was 6.6% in May, the highest of any racial group and well above the national average of 4.3%.
- Black unemployment spiked sharply after Trump returned to office in 2025, reaching a more than four-year high of 8.2% in November 2025, even as the unemployment rate held steady for other racial groups.
- The spike in unemployment coincided with DOGE-induced federal layoffs, which disproportionately impacted Black women.
- Trump’s Equal Employment Opportunity (EEO) Commission moved to discontinue the EEO-1 report, which can reveal where people of color are not getting hired or promoted, making racial discrimination in the job market harder to detect and enforce.
- Black worker pay has eroded under Trump. Median weekly real earnings among full-time Black workers have dropped by 4% since Trump took office as rising inflation eats up wage gains.
