Toward the end of his 2024 presidential campaign, then-candidate Donald Trump pledged to “cut your energy costs in half within 12 months after taking office.” The promise was outlandish, but Trump is hardly the first politician to make outlandish promises. In his first 12 months in office, the price of gas did come down, modestly, as did the price of heating oil. (Electricity and natural gas got somewhat more expensive, and diesel held steady.) The dramatic “Energy Dominance” agenda promised to further establish the United States as a net exporter of various forms of energy.
Then, this spring came the war with Iran, and prices in the United States, especially the price of diesel, went up, up, up.
At times, the president has shown leadership and political resolve in the face of these increases, making the case that they are a price worth paying if it means Iran will never have a nuclear weapon.
And then there are moments like the present. The midterms are three weeks away and diesel prices, which percolate through the economy in various inflationary ways, are a problem. The price of diesel has risen by roughly 50 percent since the start of the Iran war, prior to which it had been steady for several years. As the timing suggests, the fighting in the Middle East is the major contributing factor. In addition to the difficulty of getting crude oil out of the region, refining capacity throughout the Gulf has been extensively damaged. Making matters worse for diesel prices is the war between Russia and Ukraine, and Kyiv’s effective long-range strike campaign targeting Russia’s refineries.
In short, Trump has an acute political and economic problem. His attempt to address it in recent days has led to one of the most embarrassing weeks of his second term.