Year in Review: Biden’s roller coaster year closely tied to gas prices
Christian Datoc
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President Joe Biden‘s approval rating tanked in his second year in office, and a spike in domestic gas prices was a leading driver.
Biden’s numbers never completely recovered, despite a bounce after Russia invaded Ukraine. But they often did go up when gas prices went down.
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Furthermore, with gas prices currently sinking to their lowest levels in a year and a half, the White House is taking a cautious victory lap heading into Biden’s third year in office.
Though positive for his first months in office, Biden’s approval rating fell below 50% in August 2021 following the U.S. withdrawal from Afghanistan and slowly fell over the remainder of the year, according to RealClearPolitics. On Christmas 2021, only 43% of the electorate approved of his job in office, compared to 53% who disapproved, and the president hit January 2022 10.2 points underwater.
By the time of the Russian invasion on Feb. 24, Biden’s approvals had fallen to 40.5%, a 12-point negative margin.
Meanwhile, U.S. retail gas prices registered $3.38 per gallon on average on Jan. 3 but slowly started climbing during the buildup to the Russian invasion and had risen above $3.70 by Feb. 24.
The next two weeks marked the only period this year in which gas prices rose, rather precipitously, and Biden’s also bounced. The president’s rating jumped back a point and a half on average, registering 42.9% on March 14 when retail gas was costing the public more than $4.41 per gallon.
Gas prices continued to rise through the summer, cresting at an average price per gallon of $5.10 nationally in mid-June but slowly began to decline again through the fall. On Sept. 19, gas averaged $3.77 per gallon, a higher figure than during the breakout of war in February but still significantly lower than the summer peak.
Similarly, Biden’s approval ratings plummeted over the summer and continued to fall after gas prices stopped increasing. The president bottomed out at 36% disapproving in July, but like gas prices, his approval rating more or less returned to its pre-war level by Sept. 19, when he again registered 42.5% approval.
Gas prices continued their downward trend through the fall, slipping back below 2021 levels in November, and on Thursday, the national average fell to just over $3.10 per gallon, nearly as low as pre-pandemic levels in 2019.
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Similarly, Biden is wrapping up 2022 with the highest approval rating he’s notched this year. As of Thursday, 43.5% of voters approved of his job as president. Though the administration has undoubtedly been buoyed by Democrats’ stronger-than-expected performance in the midterm elections and a series of legislative wins, the White House’s own top messengers are making it clear they view gas prices as the big driver behind Biden’s late-year rise.
“President Biden promised he would address Putin’s Price Hike at the pump, and he is,” the White House said in a statement on Dec. 16, recognizing that gas prices had fallen below September 2021 levels. “He is releasing oil from the Strategic Petroleum Reserve. He rallied international partners to release an unprecedented amount of oil. And he has been calling on oil and gas companies to pass their savings on input costs to consumers at the pump.”
White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre, who was forced to fend off questions over the summer over why the administration couldn’t do more to lower gas prices, has taken to touting the recent decreases as a sign that Biden’s economic agenda is effectively combating inflation.
“We have more work to do, as we know. The president has been doing a lot of work on getting gas prices down, and we have seen that fall about $1.75,” she said during a briefing on Dec. 13. “We’re just going to continue to do the work to make sure that we do what we can to lower costs for American families.”
Furthermore, senior adviser to the president Mike Donilon also pegged Biden’s approval rise to falling gas prices in a year-end memo distributed to Democrats.
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“Gas prices continue to drop. The national average has dropped to $3.129 per gallon. That is the lowest average price the country has seen since July 4, 2021, and we appear to be on track for the average price to fall under $3 per gallon by the end of the year,” he wrote. “Already 22 states have seen the average cost in their state drop below $3 per gallon, with another four states likely to drop below $3 per gallon this week.”