In case you hadn’t heard, the news about the US economy is very good.

But it’s far from clear this is going to make a difference for Republicans in the midterm elections. If it doesn’t, part of the blame will go to a mainstream media that is doing its best to downplay the story. But the real culprit may be the man who is, like it or not, the principle architect of prosperity: President Trump.

Last Friday we learned that the country’s GDP hit 4.1 percent. That’s the highest in four years and among a raft of statistics that demonstrates American business has been booming since Trump took office.

Growth is accelerating and is likely to continue. It’s also sufficiently diverse such that it appears America is becoming less reliant on exports. That’ll make it easier to avoid the worst consequences of any trade wars that the protectionist-in-chief in the White House seeks to wage.

Nor is GDP the only bright spot. Investment is pouring back into the United States to the tune of trillions of dollars. Plunging rates of unemployment and rising wages show Trump is also delivering for his working-class supporters as well as businesses.

Nor is there much doubt that the good news is the direct result of administration policies. The tax cuts passed by Congress are part of the recipe. But Trump’s emphasis on deregulation has also fueled optimism, investment and spending while reviving the energy sector.

Yet the media’s reaction was less than enthusiastic. Virtually every story about these upbeat figures reported in The New York Times gave grudging acknowledgment of the benefits to the nation and Trump’s responsibility, but also tried to argue that it was all a mirage that’ll soon disappear.

Anyone who remembers how the same outlets did their best to inflate every nugget of good news so as to make us think President Barack Obama’s anemic economic recovery was a boom understands how blatantly biased the reporting about the Trump economy has been. Those same liberal pundits predicted Trump would wreck the economy and that his boasts that the country would enjoy a 4 percent rise in GDP were science fiction.

But as much as some in the GOP are trying to keep the conversation on the economy, they’re not succeeding.

The problem starts in a White House where the presidential Twitter account remains its loudest means of communication.

Instead of engaging in an all-out media offensive to focus the country on the positive reports, the emphasis quickly shifted to more attacks on Trump’s former attorney Michael Cohen, special counsel Robert Mueller and threats to shut down the government if Congress doesn’t vote for funding for a border wall.

Republican candidates are following the president’s lead. Many are running more as opponents of illegal immigration, sanctuary cities and the anti-Trump “resistance” than as proponents of a Trump economic boom that Democrats shouldn’t be allowed to sabotage.

With Democrats playing their familiar class-warfare card by opposing tax cuts and the surprising revival of enthusiasm for socialism on the left, as evidenced by the way Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez has become the party’s new rock star, you’d think the GOP would spend more time taking ownership of the best economic news the country’s heard in more than a decade.

With a president who’s always the center of attention and often for reasons that don’t help him or his party, it seems at times this year that Republicans are trying to disprove James Carville’s rule that elections are decided by “the economy, stupid.” In doing so, they’re playing right into their opponents’ hands.

For all of his other obvious faults, Trump is succeeding on the economic front and, with luck, might even avoid killing the goose that laid the golden egg with unnecessary trade wars. It may be too much to hope that the White House can avoid such distractions in the upcoming months. But if Trump and other Republicans don’t learn to disengage from debates that rile up the base but won’t necessarily help re-elect their congressional majorities, it won’t be solely the fault of their liberal press opponents.

Jonathan S. Tobin is editor in chief of JNS.org.