Former President Donald Trump seared President Joe Biden over his handling of the inflationary wave hammering American households, telling rally-goers in Arizona, that the true rate of inflation is far higher than the official rate of 9.1 percent.
Trump made the remarks at a Friday rally in Prescott Valley, where the former president was stumping on behalf of former TV anchor Kari Lake in her bid to become Arizona's next governor in the upcoming GOP primary election.
During his speech, Trump touted his own record on the economy, including high job creation and low inflation.
‘The Worst Inflation'
Trump told rally-goers that under his tenure, "we had the greatest economy in the history of the world with no inflation," while adding that "Biden created the worst inflation in 47 years."
February 2017, the first full month of Trump in office, saw the headline Consumer Price Index (CPI) inflation gauge at 2.8 percent in annual terms. While the CPI measure fluctuated during his tenure, the highest it ever reached was 2.9 percent in July 2018, while in his final month in office, January 2021, inflation clocked in at 1.4 percent.
Inflation has climbed steadily under Biden, soaring 9.1 percent year-over-year in June 2022, a figure not seen in over 40 years.
Commerce Secretary Gina Raimondo told CBS News' "Face the Nation," on July 24, that inflation in the United States has "probably" peaked, while acknowledging that factors "out of our control" like another war or pandemic could once again cause price growth to accelerate.
‘War on American Energy'
While Trump did not go into detail as to the Biden policies that he thinks have sent inflation soaring, he did single out what he called "Biden's war on American energy."
Soaring energy prices have been one of the key contributing factors to inflation, accounting for around half of the headline inflation figure, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics.
Since taking office, Biden has signed a number of executive orders targeting the oil industry, such as revoking the Keystone XL pipeline permit, freezing new oil and gas drilling leases on federal lands and waters, and ending fossil fuel subsidies by certain agencies.
The price of gasoline is around double what it was when Biden took office, with the president variously blaming a lack of refining capacity, global supply shortfalls set against a sharp post-pandemic rebound in demand, the war in Ukraine, and corporate greed.
In a bid to lower gasoline prices, Biden has ordered the release of crude reserves from the national strategic reserve, called on U.S. refiners to boost output, and pushed OPEC to pump more oil.
via zerohedge