Atlanta’s Federal Reserve is steadily rolling back its barnburner prediction for third quarter GDP ahead of the Commerce Department’s official release on Tuesday, as a drop in GDP over the previous quarter leaves the Trump administration attempting to pump expectations about the economy ahead of the 2026 midterm election year.

The Atlanta Federal Reserve issues a model estimate every week predicting real GDP growth. Last week, it lowered its estimate for third quarter GDP to a healthy, but smaller 3.5 percent, down one tenth of a percent from a week earlier after incorporating new data on consumer spending and inventory investment provided by the Census Bureau and Bureau of Labor Statistics. The unofficial forecast is also down from its 4.2 percent high estimated in the week before Thanksgiving. 

Still, the Atlanta bureau is at the high end of the range of Blue-Chip consensus. An average of analysts shows they expect the economy to grow just 2.9 percent this year, a drop from the second quarter’s 3.8 percent annualized rate. 

Tuesday’s estimate, delayed from its original release date of October 30 due to the September government shutdown, will be accompanied by other economic figures. They include October’s durable goods report, the Federal Reserve’s industrial production forecasts for October and November, and the regularly scheduled consumer confidence survey.

Together, with Wednesday’s job numbers, the list offers a moving picture of how the economy is performing following a half-year’s worth of tariffs, a churning job market, and fears about an upcoming explosion in health insurance costs.

The Trump administration is bullish about the data. “Since July, we’ve had a lot of positive news about the economy. We’ve had a couple of quarters of almost four percent growth. We’ve got a big government surplus actually running for a few months in a row,” President Trump’s director of the National Economic Council, Kevin Hassett, told CBS’s “Face the Nation” on Sunday.

Still, unease over incomes, inflation, and investments persists as public polling shows a plurality of Americans say they are concerned about housing and food affordability while also wanting President Trump to focus on inflation, a lingering concern since the 2022 spike in interest rates put the brakes on the housing and lending markets and sent food prices skyrocketing. The inflationary spiral has slowed since then, though the consumer price index increased to 2.7 percent in November, up from 2.3 percent in April.

With his usual flourish, Mr. Trump addressed the nation last week, saying he is fixing a mess he inherited from the previous administration.

America is “poised for an economic boom, the likes of which the world has never seen,” he promised.

As election season rounds the corner, Mr. Hassett suggested that voters have little to worry about. The One Big Beautiful Bill passed by congressional Republicans over the summer will result in massive tax refunds for overtime workers, seniors, and people earning tips.  

“You’re going to see the biggest tax refund season of all time,” Mr. Hassett said on Fox News Sunday.

At the same time, the deficit is down by $600 billion from a year ago, he said, enabling a $2,000 giveaway to households earning less than $100,000 per year. 

“In the summer, I wasn’t so sure that there was space for a check like that, but now I’m pretty sure that there is, and so I would expect that in the new year, the president will bring forth a proposal to Congress to make that happen,” he said. 

Where that money comes from remains a mystery. Whether it appeases voters to keep the president’s party in power also is uncertain. The latest analysis from Crystal Ball shows a Republican pickup in the House even as more and more pundits predict a Democratic takeover.

“This change is not being driven by changes in beliefs about the economy, which remain steadily gloomy, but instead by changes in Democratic and independent voters’ estimations,” the editors write. “With another year to go, the jury is still out.”