Trump brags about screaming at Macron until he gave in, but the demand he made reveals he doesn’t understand how France works

During a stop on his “Affordability Tour” in Rome, Georgia, President Donald Trump put on a dramatic performance, reenacting a phone call where he claimed he screamed at French President Emmanuel Macron until Macron agreed to his demands. According to Trump, he called “heads of countries like France” and told Macron that France needed to “double or triple” its drug prices to make up for the lower prices in the United States.

According to Mediaite, Trump also claimed he had already cut drug prices in the U.S. by “400, 500, even 600%,” which he often presents as a major second-term achievement. The reenactment had Trump playing both sides of the conversation, raising his voice to mimic himself yelling at Macron.

He portrayed himself telling Macron, “Emanuel, you have to lift your price by double or triple.” When “Macron” supposedly refused, saying, “No way. I will not do that, Donald. Why would I do that? I would be out of business,” Trump claimed he responded, “You’re going to do it. 100%.” Trump then delivered his supposed ultimatum: “Here’s the story, if you don’t do it I’m going to put a 100% tariff on all of the wine and champagne that you sell in the United States.”

The story falls apart because Macron does not actually control drug prices in France

The punchline of Trump’s story was “Macron” immediately giving in and saying, “I will do it. I will gladly do it.” Trump also claimed he had similar tariff-threatening conversations with other unnamed world leaders, all of whom supposedly made concessions. This is part of a broader pattern of Trump making bold claims about his influence over foreign leaders, much like his move to bypass Congress and unilaterally rewrite election rules.

However, there is a major problem with this account. The French president simply does not have the power to control drug prices in France. Like many countries, France has a complex system for regulating medication costs that no single political leader can unilaterally change with a phone call.

Commentator Lawrence O’Donnell pointed out this flaw, noting that Trump had told the same story at a cabinet meeting back in January. O’Donnell called Trump’s account “pure hallucination from start to finish.” Trump’s tendency to make sweeping and unverified claims has been well documented, as seen in his 490-word social media meltdown over Bill Maher.

O’Donnell also suggested that everyone in the room listening to Trump knew that such a conversation never actually took place with Macron or any other world leader. The core issue is that even if the phone call did happen, the outcome Trump described would be impossible, since Macron simply does not have the authority to raise drug prices across France on his own.