Rising prices are putting pressure on Donald Trump and the Republican Party as the mid-term elections approach in November.
Inflation continues to soar in the United States: it reached a three-year high in April, according to data released on Tuesday, reflecting the surge in gas prices and a rise in food costs. At 3.8%, the Consumer Price Index (CPI) recorded its highest annual pace in May 2023.
This new data is adding pressure on the Donald Trump administration as the mid-term elections approach in November. During the 2024 election campaign, Trump promised to lower prices and create a new “golden age” for Americans. He stated on Tuesday that this high inflation is only “temporary” and will significantly decrease when the war with Iran is over.
The government has been insisting for weeks that the disruptions related to the war it initiated in the Middle East are temporary. They describe them as the price to pay to prevent Iran from ever acquiring nuclear weapons. In the data released on Tuesday, gasoline stands out with a 28.4% increase in fuel prices over a year. But price hikes are also widespread in the rest of the economy, from rents to plane tickets. After a pause in March, food prices rebounded in April (+2.9% year-on-year, +0.7% month-on-month).
This increase “appears to be related to energy,” with producers passing on the costs they are facing, said Samuel Tombs, an analyst at Pantheon Macroeconomics, in a note. In the land of burgers, beef is among the products whose cost is alarming consumers. In April, you had to spend 16.1% more than a year ago for a beef steak. The increase was 14.5% for ground beef. Signs of relief are rare, for example at dealerships (-2.7% year-on-year for used vehicles).
Opposition blames Trump
“For the first time in three years, inflation is outpacing wage increases. This is a blow to middle and working-class households,” said Heather Long, an economist at Navy Federal Credit Union. The president “Donald Trump had promised to lower prices ‘from day one’ (of his term in January 2025, editor’s note). Instead, he keeps pushing them up,” said Democratic senator Elizabeth Warren.
She sees the current inflation as a direct consequence of the president’s personal decisions, hitting imports with multiple tariffs and going to war against Iran on February 28th alongside Israel. In gas stations, the impact of the Middle East war continued to be felt in May.
A gallon of regular gasoline currently costs an average of 4.50 dollars, up from about 3 dollars just before the conflict started, according to the American Automobile Association (AAA). At 5.64 dollars per gallon, diesel, used in trucks and tractors, is approaching the record set in June 2022 (5.82 dollars), a few months after Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.
The problem, noted economist Diane Swonk of KPMG, is that “the rise in gas prices is adding to other energy costs dating back before the war in Iran.” She specifically refers to the unpopular increase in electricity (+6.1%), attributed to high demand from data centers, “a major issue in the November elections.”
