WHITE HOUSE SPIN: #PUTINSPRICEHIKE. Democrats are terrified of the effect inflation will have on their chances in this November’s midterm elections. For months, Republican strategists have been planning campaigns against Democrats focused on inflation, especially on the price of gas. “That pisses everybody off,” a GOP strategist said in a conversation in early February. “People care about getting pissed off every time they buy a tank of gas.”
Inflation, not just in energy prices but in everything, also has a highly negative effect on the job approval rating of President Joe Biden. And a president’s job approval rating is perhaps the best predictor of his party’s performance in midterm elections. When the president’s rating is below 50%, his party’s midterm election losses are likely to top 35 seats in the House, according to a historical analysis done by Gallup. Biden’s job approval rating at the moment is 42.9%, according to the RealClearPolitics average of polls. If history is a guide, Democrats will lose the House to Republicans.
Meanwhile, inflation is raging. New figures from the government show that inflation in February was 7.9% on an annual basis. That is the highest number in 40 years, since 1982, when inflation ravaged the economy.
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The price of food rose right on the average, 7.9% annually. But the price of gasoline rose 38% on an annual basis. Fuel oil rose 43.6%. The price of used cars and trucks rose 41.2%. The price of clothing rose 6.6%. That is making life difficult for everyone. A recent Bloomberg report noted that an annual inflation rate of 7.5%, slightly below the latest number, “is costing the average household $276 per month.”
That’s a dreadful situation with elections less than eight months away. So the Biden White House is working 24/7 to try to deflect blame for inflation — to blame somebody, anybody, rather than have the voters’ unhappiness focus on the president of the United States.
The latest effort from the White House is to label inflation “Putin’s price hike.” The idea is to cast blame on Russian leader Vladimir Putin, who, with the invasion of Ukraine, deserves a lot of blame for a lot of things. Biden rolled out the phrase on Tuesday, when he noted that the disruption caused by the Russian invasion, with sanctions and bans on oil purchase, would raise prices. “I’m going to do everything I can to minimize Putin’s price hike here at home,” Biden said. On Thursday, when the 7.9% inflation report came out, Biden said in a statement, “Today’s inflation report is a reminder that Americans’ budgets are being stretched by price increases and families are starting to feel the impacts of Putin’s price hike.”
The White House PR effort caused Fox News’s Bret Baier to remark, “The administration clearly is trying to do ‘#PutinsPriceHike’ to link onto all of this.”
The problem with “Putin’s price hike” is that inflation was raging well before Putin invaded Ukraine. It was raging before Putin began to build up forces in preparation for the invasion of Ukraine. Doesn’t the White House remember last year, when inflation, which was at an annual rate of 1.4% in January 2021, hit 5% in May and the White House was trying to reassure nervous people that it was “transitory?” Meanwhile, Biden and Democrats in Congress were pushing massive spending proposals that would have an inflationary effect.
So now — yes, the Ukraine invasion is raising oil prices as we speak. But that’s now. For the last year, the inflation that has set the public on edge and taken away any higher wages people might have received was not “Putin’s price hike.” Those non-Putin inflationary factors continue today. That is plain for all to see. For example, Steven Rattner, the financier who led former President Barack Obama’s bailout of the auto industry in 2009, tweeted in response to Biden’s statement: “Well, no. These are February numbers and only include small Russia effect. This is Biden’s inflation and he needs to own it.” That is not likely to make Rattner any friends at the White House.
Republicans, of course, said much the same thing as Rattner. “These aren’t Putin’s prices. They’re President Biden’s prices,” House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy said. In a tweet, McCarthy added, “No one is buying the Democrats’ desperate excuses for inflation, but everyone is paying for them.”
Nevertheless, the “Putin’s price hike” gambit has worked on a few journalists. On CNN, anchor Victor Blackwell asked network economic analyst Rana Foroohar, “So, when the president says, and the White House doubled down, Jen Psaki says that inflation, gas prices are in large part due to Putin’s war, there is some credence to that?” Foroohar answered immediately, “100%.”
In the Washington Post, columnist Dana Milbank described McCarthy’s objection to “Putin’s price hike” this way: “[Biden] dubbed it ‘Putin’s price hike’ and said ‘Russia is responsible.’ Republicans leaped to Putin’s defense.” He then quoted McCarthy. In some corners of the Washington Post, pointing out that inflation has been rising for the last year is, apparently, leaping to Putin’s defense. Narrative trumps accuracy.
So look for the White House to keep pushing the “Putin’s price hike” routine. It’s grossly misleading, of course, but stakes are high, and at the moment, it’s all they’ve got.
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