President Joe Biden has attempted to blame various scapegoats, from Russian President Vladimir Putin to big corporations, for the nation’s inflation woes. But thanks to the latest data and his own promises, the president officially owns the inflation disaster.
We just got yet more alarming metrics from the Bureau of Labor Statistics, showing inflation rising 8.2% from September 2021 to September 2022 — with double-digit increases in key goods from food to energy and beyond. This is the last inflation update we will receive before the November midterm elections, dealing a death blow to whatever hope Democrats had that inflation would ease before voters head to the polls. Remember when it was “transitory?”
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Biden and his allies must now walk into the final stretch of this election with an inflation anchor weighing them down. And because of their own missteps, there’s no more deflecting responsibility.
Remember, Biden signed the Inflation Reduction Act into law in August. He promised this bill would “fight inflation and lower costs for American families.” Just on Sept. 13, the president had a celebratory event at the White House touting how awesome the plan was. Now, just a month later, we’re still seeing disastrous price increases. Oh, and real wages (adjusted for purchasing power) are declining, not rising. Wasn’t the president’s legislation supposed to stop this?
Well, the president’s claims about the so-called Inflation Reduction Act were always, to borrow a term, “malarkey.” It was never anything more than a partisan grab bag of unrelated spending projects and regulations. An Ivy League analysis warned us from the get-go that it would have a “statistically indistinguishable from zero” impact on inflation. Even Bernie Sanders — yes, that Bernie Sanders! — admitted that “it will in fact have a minimal impact on inflation,” although he nonetheless voted it for partisan reasons. So, Biden knowingly passed a legislative lie that he claimed would reduce inflation, and shocker, it has not reduced inflation.
This isn’t just a failure. It removes any valid excuse from the president that this isn’t his fault.
Prior to passing this joke of a bill, Biden could argue, not entirely without basis, that things like high gas prices are partially due to global factors beyond his control, although his policies have certainly made them worse. So, too, he could point to the significant spending Republicans passed before he took office as part of the problem. But then Biden truly set himself up for failure. He passed hallmark legislation he promised the public would reduce inflation, thus taking on the mantle entirely. But because that legislation was a farce never actually intended to address inflation in any meaningful way, it hasn’t had any effect.
Now, Biden heads into the midterm elections with his party bearing the full blame in the minds of millions of voters, for whom this issue is a top priority. And he has no one to blame for this political and economic fiasco except himself.
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Brad Polumbo (@Brad_Polumbo) is a co-founder of Based-Politics.com, a co-host of the Based Politics podcast, and a Washington Examiner contributor.
