In the past few months, I’ve been particularly critical of President Trump’s comments on the economy, reiterating that you can’t spin people’s perceptions of their own finances. People know how much they’re making, how much they’re paying for groceries and other expenses, how much they have left over at the end of the month, and if they have a 401(k), how it’s doing.

One of Trump’s recurring bad habits was characterizing gas prices as being lower than they actually were. From Trump’s inauguration to the start of the war against Iran, gasoline prices remained fairly flat, steady around three dollars per gallon in the national average. That’s not particularly expensive, and many consumers would characterize those prices as pretty good. The problem is that during this time, President Trump repeatedly insisted that gas prices would soon be close to two dollars a gallon, or at two dollars a gallon, or below two dollars a gallon. During a press conference in Tokyo on October 28, Trump predicted, “I think you’re gonna see two-dollar gasoline pretty soon.” On November 7, Trump said, “We’re going to be at $2 gasoline. We’re going to be approximately $2 very soon. We’re a little bit above $2 right now for gasoline.” In Saudi Arabia, Trump said, “Gasoline is way down, I think you’ll be seeing $2 gasoline, but we’re now at $2.50, $2.45, some are lower than that.”

You could occasionally find a gas station with gas that was $2 per gallon or less, but those were exceptionally rare.

On February 27, Trump was in Corpus Christi, Texas, and accurately stated, “slashing energy costs is among the most important actions we can take to bring down prices for American consumers. Because when you cut the cost of energy, you really cut — you just cut the cost of everything.”

You may recall that the U.S. military operation against the Iranians started about 24 hours later. It is a little odd to talk about the importance of keeping energy costs low, right before taking action that is just about guaranteed to drive energy costs higher, at least in the short term. And the inverse is true – when you increase the cost of energy, you increase the cost of almost everything else, too.

As one would expect, the start of a new shooting war in the Middle East caused oil prices and gas prices to spike. In the last week of February, the national average for a gallon of regular gasoline was $2.98.

Since the start of the war, Trump has contended that the increased prices are a short-term consequence and would reverse themselves quickly. On March 11, at a rally in Kentucky, Trump said, “oil prices are already coming back down and it’s going to come down.”

The “coming back down” Trump was referring to was a short-lived decline from about $95 per barrel to $85 per barrel; prices went back up to $98 per barrel shortly thereafter.

As I write this, Brent crude futures have reached $113 a barrel; by the time you read this, they may have increased or decreased. But the fact remains that the average gas price in the U.S. this morning according to AAA is $3.88; that’s a 90 cent jump in less than a month. The U.S. Energy Information Administration had its weekly-updated national average at $2.79 on February 23; as of March 16, they have it at $3.56.

High gasoline prices are bad news for the economy and extremely bad news for Republican hopes of keeping the House and Senate in the midterm elections. Another round of “prices will come down soon, just you wait and see” promises from the president will not mitigate the GOP’s problems.

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