Conservatives attack White House's 'Putin price hike' narrative as inflation surges

(Image credit: Drew Angerer/Getty Images)

Republicans slammed the Biden administration for blaming inflation on Russian President Vladimir Putin after a report released Tuesday showed that consumer prices have jumped 8.5 percent since March 2021.

"We expect March … [Consumer Price Index] headline inflation to be extraordinarily elevated due to Putin's price hike," White House Press Secretary Jen Psaki said Monday ahead of the release of Tuesday's inflation report.

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Podcast host Ben Shapiro tweeted that "[m]ost of the inflation happened before Putin's invasion of Ukraine," claiming that the White House is "lying, as usual" about the cause of inflation.

Former U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations Nikki Haley blasted the Biden administration's narrative. "You're going to hear a lot about 'Putin's Price Hike' today. Food and gas prices were already soaring. Wages can't keep up with inflation. This is Biden's economy," she wrote.

Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis (R) blamed inflation on "federal policies of borrowing & printing money at unfathomable levels & bad energy policy."

In a video posted to Twitter, Brad Polumbo of the right-libertarian Foundation for Economic Education said, "New inflation data are in, and ooh boy they destroyed the White House's narrative."

"To be clear," Polumbo continued, "Putin's invasion of Ukraine definitely has disrupted global energy markets and led to higher gas prices, but gas prices were rising for almost nine months before the invasion began, and prices overall have been surging since May of 2021."

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Grayson Quay was the weekend editor at TheWeek.com. His writing has also been published in National Review, the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, Modern Age, The American Conservative, The Spectator World, and other outlets. Grayson earned his M.A. from Georgetown University in 2019.