Fox News White House Correspondent Peter Doocy was on fire once again during Thursday’s White House Press Briefing, as he sparred with White House Press Secretary Jen Psaki about inflation and gas prices.
“We just heard you say again that you think inflation is going to be temporary,” Doocy pointed out. “We’ve heard you say that it was going to be temporary since last spring. So how long do you guys think temporary is?”
“Well, again, Peter, I think what we do is we rely on the assessments of the Federal Reserve and of outside economic analysts who give an assessment of how long it will last,” said Psaki. “The expectations and their assessment at this point continue to be that it will moderate by the end of the year. There’s also no question that when a foreign dictator invades a foreign country and when that foreign dictator is the head of a country that is the third-largest supplier of oil in the world, that … that is going to have an effect. And it is.”
Related: Is This the Dumbest Claim Jen Psaki Has Ever Made?
Then Doocy asked the million-dollar question.
“And so to that point, inflation goes up today. The president’s statement blames the ‘Putin price hike.’ Are you guys just going to start blaming Putin for everything until the midterms?”
Bam! So good!
Of course, Psaki had no good answer. “Well, we’ve seen the price of gas go up at least 75 cents since President Putin lined up troops on the border of Ukraine,” she said, trying to deflect from the fact that the bulk of the increase in gas prices occurred under Biden and before Russia invaded Ukraine.
“And last month, the statement didn’t mention the Putin price hike,” Doocy pointed out. “It mentioned inflation because of the pandemic. Why is that?”
Psaki then went into a patronizing word salad about the pandemic causing inflation before doubling down on the whole “Blame Putin” thing.
Watching Doocy go after Psaki is always a thrill.
Long story short, the answer to the question about whether the Biden administration will “blame Putin for everything until the midterms” is, obviously, yes.
Join the conversation as a VIP Member