Biden Admin Now Touting $4.30/Gallon Gas as an Accomplishment

Trying to keep up with the
Biden administration’s
spin these days is a great way to give yourself motion sickness.

The White House’s latest mental gymnastics come courtesy of the president’s Twitter feed, where he has put out a number of statements trying to take credit for recent minor reductions in
gas prices.
For example, President Joe Biden is now trying to take a victory lap because he says gas prices have fallen 65 cents over the last 40 days.

This is absurd for a number of reasons.

For one, gas prices remain at $4.30 per gallon nationwide,
according to AAA
. And in many parts of the country, as the below map shows, they remain north of $5 per gallon. These are insanely high gas prices, and in any other context, they would be viewed as a massive red flag for a president, not something to celebrate or take credit for.

This is kind of like when politicians shut down the economy with lockdowns during
the COVID-19 pandemic
and then, after businesses reopened and many (but not all) of the jobs came back, said, “Look at all the jobs I created!”

What’s more, Biden was just a hot minute ago telling us that gas prices weren’t his fault at all. Remember, the White House pushed the
fake narrative
that it was all just “Putin’s price hike,” happening because of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine — even though gas prices had risen significantly under Biden’s watch well before the invasion began.

Biden doesn’t get to have it both ways.

If the president had no culpability for higher gas prices, he can’t take credit for lower gas prices. And vice versa: If he does deserve credit for these lower prices, then he deserves blame for the higher prices.

Consistency, people. Is it really too much to ask for?

This is kind of similar to something former
President Donald Trump
used to do. He would routinely take credit for the stock market when it made record gains, even though no president is really fully responsible for the fluctuations of the market. But he would never say anything or acknowledge any fault when it crashed.

Voters should see through this kind of dishonest spin, regardless of whether the politician pushing it is a Democrat or a Republican. Focus on reality, not rhetoric.

Analysts have always maintained that gas prices are influenced by many factors, not all of which are within Biden’s (or any president’s) control. That said, he has certainly
worsened the problem and driven prices higher
through his anti-energy policies and rhetoric that have discouraged domestic supply.

It’s not all bad. We do have a strong labor market and low unemployment rate, for one thing. But the economy is shrinking,
real wages are declining
, inflation is surging, and gas prices are bankrupting the public. The president is going to have to do a lot better than
redefining words
and taking credit for minor reductions in prices if he wants to salvage the hot mess that is our economy under Bidenomics.

Brad Polumbo (
@Brad_Polumbo
) is a co-founder of
Based-Politics.com
, a co-host of the BasedPolitics
podcast
, and a Washington Examiner contributor.