Saying the Word Is Now Treason; Nation Searches for Another Way to Put It

By our Economics Correspondent · Filed carefully · September 12, 2026

The President signed an order Saturday morning designating public use of a particular eight-letter economic noun an act of treason, describing the word as “a psychological operation with a dictionary entry.” The order asserts that the condition does not exist and that naming it is what causes it, a position the administration described as “both” when asked which.

The Constitution defines treason narrowly, as levying war against the United States or adhering to its enemies. Asked how a noun satisfies either limb, a White House counsel said the word had been “adhering” for some time, and moved to the next question. Four constitutional scholars reached Saturday used the word repeatedly while explaining why it could not be criminalised, and two asked afterward whether that had been wise.

“We are not banning a fact. There is no fact. We are banning a rumour that has been going around for three years and has gotten into the milk.”

The Bureau of Labor Statistics published its monthly release on schedule at 8:30 a.m. The document contained every figure it normally contains and, in place of the noun, a black rectangle. The rectangle appears forty-one times. In the summary paragraph, where the word would ordinarily be followed by a percentage, the release reads: “The                 rate was 3.4 percent,” which economists agreed was clear enough.

The order provides approved alternatives, and this is where the difficulty begins. Agencies may refer to “price enthusiasm,” “numerical drift,” “the general upward,” or “what the dollar is going through.” A Treasury official attempting to use the third of these in a sentence Saturday arrived at “the general upward is up,” paused, and asked to start again.

Approved substitutions, per the order

• Price enthusiasm. Preferred in consumer contexts.
• Numerical drift. For use in written reports only; the order notes it “sounds worse out loud.”
• The general upward. Adjective and noun. The order does not specify which.
• What the dollar is going through. Permitted once per document.
• Deflation. Explicitly permitted, and encouraged, regardless of accuracy.

The Federal Reserve, whose statutory mandate is maximum employment and stable prices, held a press conference at noon. The Chair spoke for nineteen minutes about employment. Asked about the other half of the mandate, he said that the Committee remains attentive to the second thing, that the second thing is running above the Committee’s long-run goal for the second thing, and that the Committee is prepared to act on the second thing. A reporter asked him to name the second thing. He thanked her for the question and called on someone else.

Enforcement is assigned to the Department of Justice, which noted Saturday that treason carries a maximum penalty of death and asked for clarification. A White House spokesman said the penalty would be “a fine, initially,” and that the word treason had been chosen “for the seriousness, not the consequence.” Pressed on whether a lesser designation might have achieved the seriousness, he said that it would not have. He then asked that the question be struck from the transcript as needlessly precise.

Compliance so far is partial. Grocery shoppers interviewed in four states declined to use the word and had no difficulty communicating. “Eggs,” said one Cleveland woman, gesturing at eggs. A man in Tucson said he understood the order and supported it, and that his rent had gone up four hundred dollars, and that these were separate matters he was holding separately.

Markets closed before the order and will open Monday into a week in which the principal driver of asset prices has no legal name. Two large banks have already circulated internal guidance. One instructs analysts to write “CPI” wherever they would have written the word, on the grounds that an acronym is not a word. The other has advised staff to use a hand gesture.