With consumer sentiment surging and the stock market setting record highs, Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen will travel to the Midwest this week to promote President Biden's economic record and take a rare shot at former President Trump's approach.

Why it matters: Team Biden has spent the last two years playing defense on the economy. With economic numbers and "vibes" finally improving — including a 28% jump in consumer sentiment since November — officials are now going on offense.

The big picture: The White House wants to turn November's election into a choice between Biden and Trump.

• They're deploying Yellen to Middle America to help set the stage for the economic argument — and contrast — that Biden will make all year.
• "In the Trump administration, the idea of doing anything to fix it was a punchline," Yellen will say, according to excerpts obtained by Axios. "But this administration has delivered."
• "The Bipartisan Infrastructure Law is a $1.2 trillion investment in our nation's infrastructure," Yellen will say. "It is bringing new opportunities within reach for middle-class families."

Driving the news: Yellen will make her case to the Chicago Economic Club on Thursday, the same day the Commerce Department will announce U.S. GDP for 2023.

• Yellen, who rarely mentions the Trump administration, will draw implicit — and explicit — comparisons between the economic values of Biden and Trump.
• She will specifically call out Trump's signature tax deal — parts of which expire at the end of 2025 — and argue that it benefited corporations at the expense of the middle class.
• She will also note that 2023 didn't experience the recession that many economists predicted and that the unemployment rate has been under 4% for 23 months.

Zoom out: Biden started the year with a speech near Valley Forge, Pennsylvania, in which he mentioned Trump 44 times in 30 minutes, blaming the former president for spreading "lies" that led to the Jan. 6 Capitol riot.

• Across the government, the White House is working to establish Trump as a foil heading into the election.
• That task is trickier on the economy, as many Americans tell pollsters that they felt better about their economic prospects under Trump.
• But top Biden advisers are convinced that voters' opinions on Biden's handling of the economy will start to improve as the rate of inflation slows and real incomes increase.
• Eventually, the bad economic vibes will give way to the strong economic data, including consumer sentiment, a record-high S&P 500 and lower inflation, they say.

Zoom in: That theory was bolstered on Friday when the University of Michigan's consumer sentiment surged 9 points to its highest level since 2021.

• Meanwhile, inflation expectations for the year ahead are 2.9% — down 0.2 of a percentage point from December, according to Axios Macro.
• As the campaign approaches, Yellen will be spending more time on the road, barnstorming the country to promote Biden's economy — including traditional and nontraditional media appearances, like NPR's "Wait Wait ... Don't Tell Me."
• Yellen's Chicago speech, followed by a stop in Milwaukee the next day, will be mostly forward-looking. But the trained economist sometimes can't resist tweaking the doomsayers, who claimed it was impossible to lower inflation without increasing unemployment.
• "Economists who've said it's going to require very high unemployment to get this done are eating their words," she said in December.

The bottom line: Team Biden wants — and needs — some credit for achieving a soft landing for the economy.

• But it also wants voters to take a hard look at Trump's overall economic values — and an approach that Biden officials say favors the wealthiest Americans.