The national debt increased 39 percent during Trump’s presidency.
By December 21, 2020, with just a few weeks left in Trump’s one-term presidency, the national debt had climbed to $27.76 trillion—a 39-percent jump from the $19.95-trillion debt the country had four years prior when this self-described “king of debt” was sworn into office.ted from the COVID-19 pandemic, but the pre-pandemic debt amount had already made for a “national debt crisis” and a “grave threat to our economic and societal prosperity” in the words of Trump’s own administration.