Fact Check: Biden Blames Inflation on Trump

Claim: President Joe Biden claimed on Wednesday that inflation was “skyrocketing” when he took office.

“Look we have dramatically reduced inflation from 9% down to close to 3% we’re in a situation where we’re better situated and we were we took office, where we inflation was skyrocketing,” Biden said Wednesday at a White House press conference.

The president was reacting to the latest report on the consumer price index, which showed inflation rose at an annualized rate of 4.6 percent in March, the fourth consecutive month in which inflation has exceeded expectations.

Verdict: False.

Inflation was not skyrocketing when Biden took office. When Biden took the oath of office in January of 2021, the consumer price index was up 1.4 percent from a year earlier. The following month it was up 1.7 percent.

The personal consumption expenditure price index, the measure used by the Federal Reserve as the basis for its two percent inflation target, was up 1.6 percent in January 2021 and 1.8 percent in February.

The clip from Biden's press conference here is outrageous. Biden claims inflation was skyrocketing when he took office. https://t.co/Fj5Ghq2R43

— John Carney (read Tim’s book: Family Unfriendly) (@carney) April 11, 2024

Inflation did not rise above the the Fed’s target until March of 2021. On March 11, 2021, Biden signed into law the American Rescue Plan, which injected $1.9 trillion of stimulus into the economy. At the time, even economists allied with Democrats—like Larry Summers and Oliver Blanchard—warned that pushing that much deficit spending into an economy already recovering from the pandemic lockdowns was likely to push inflation much higher.

The consumer price index is up 18.94 percent since Biden took office, meaning inflation has averaged over six percent per year or three times the Fed’s target. During the equivalent period of Trump’s presidency, inflation rose 5.96 per year, slightly less than two percent per year on average.