Fact check: Amid spike, prominent Republicans make false claims about gas prices

Republicans face political risk from the spike in gasoline prices caused by the war President Donald Trump launched against Iran. Over the last two days, prominent Republicans have made a series of false claims about gas prices.

Sen. Tim Scott, chair of Senate Republicans’ campaign committee, falsely claimed Thursday that “gas prices continue to come down” – even though average gas prices in the US as a whole and in his home state of South Carolina had actually gone up over the last day, week, month and year, according to AAA data.

Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth falsely suggested Wednesday that the average gas price in California was $8 per gallon right before the Iran war started in late February. The state average at the time was actually $4.64 per gallon, according to AAA.

And House Majority Leader Steve Scalise falsely claimed Thursday that gas prices are much lower now than they were “two years ago,” when, he claimed, they were “$6.” Thursday’s AAA national average, $4.30 per gallon, was actually higher, not lower, than the average two years prior, when it was $3.66 per gallon.

Here is a more detailed fact check.

Scott on current gas prices

In a Thursday interview on Fox Business, Scott said, “The fact of the matter is that all of the cylinders are kicking. It is good news. You can even feel in our environment how good things are getting. Gas prices continue to come down, which means that your groceries will come down a little bit as well.”

But gas prices do not “continue to come down,” Patrick De Haan, head of petroleum analysis at the firm GasBuddy, responded to Scott’s comments with an incredulous social media post: “LOL WHAT? EVERY SINGLE STATE IS HIGHER.”

On Thursday, the national average for a gallon of regular gas, $4.30, was up 7 cents from a day prior, up 27 cents from a week prior, up 31 cents from a month prior, up $1.12 from a year prior, and up $1.32 from the day the Iran war began at the end of February, according to AAA.

In South Carolina, the Thursday state average for a gallon of regular gas, just under $3.90, was up about 1 cent from the day prior, up 24 cents from a week prior, up 25 cents from a month prior, up $1.07 from a year prior, and up $1.23 from the day the war began, per AAA data.

Gas prices are volatile, they can vary from station to station, and oil prices on global markets fell Thursday morning after rising overnight (though that certainly doesn’t mean the gas prices paid by US drivers will quickly fall). But Scott’s suggestion that there was some ongoing decline in gas prices was just not true.

Hegseth on gas prices when the war began

At a congressional hearing Wednesday, Democratic Rep. Maggie Goodlander of New Hampshire asked Hegseth if he knew what the national average price for a gallon of gas was on February 28, the day the US and Israel began the war with Iran.

Hegseth replied, “Well, it depends on where you live. If you live in California, it’s 8 bucks.”

False. The California average for regular gas wasn’t anywhere close to $8 per gallon on February 28. It was $4.64 per gallon, according to AAA. That was far below the state’s $5.98 average on Wednesday.

And while there were some California stations at $8 per gallon or more on February 28, the number was tiny – “less than 5” of the approximately 10,500 stations GasBuddy tracks in the state, De Haan said in an email. De Haan said these stations were the “usual suspects” that “always” have exceptionally high prices.

The national average on February 28 was $2.98, per AAA data; Goodlander wrongly told Hegseth during their exchange that it was “$2.83.” (Asked for comment, a spokesperson said Goodlander had been trying to cite a chart published by NBC News Wednesday morning that showed the national average was $2.83 at the beginning of January, not $2.83 at the end of February; “her point is that gas prices have increased from before the war to now,” the spokesperson said.) Goodlander correctly said the national average had gone up to $4.23 on Wednesday, per AAA data.

Scalise on gas prices two years ago

In a Thursday interview on CNBC, House Majority Leader Steve Scalise was asked if he thought there was any way Republicans would win the House again in the 2026 midterms. Scalise said that Republicans have delivered for the public – and added, “People will remember – you go back two years ago, we were paying almost $6 a gallon for gasoline. Right now it’s in the $3s. Obviously we’ve seen a jump with the Iran conflict, but it’s still…”

“When were we paying $6?” CNBC host Joe Kernen interjected in an exchange highlighted on social media by liberal journalist Aaron Rupar. Scalise claimed, “Two – two-and-a-half years ago.” Kernen responded, “That wasn’t the average price.” But Scalise asserted moments later, “We’re over 30% below where we were just two years ago.”

In reality, the national average gas price exactly two years ago Thursday, on April 30, 2024, was $3.66 per gallon, per AAA data – lower, not higher, than Thursday’s average of $4.30 per gallon. Going back to “two-and-a-half years ago,” so to the fall of 2023, doesn’t make Scalise’s claim true, either. Until the Iran war this year, the national average had been below $4 since the summer of 2022.

Asked for comment, a Scalise spokesperson said Thursday that Scalise had been “referring to 2022, when gas prices surged to record highs,” California’s state average hit a record $6.44 per gallon and prices also exceeded $6 in “parts of Washington” state.

But, obviously, 2022 was four years ago, not two or two-and-a-half years ago. And Scalise made it sound like he was talking about the country as a whole, not a small number of specific places. The national average has never hit $6 per gallon; the all-time peak was $5.02 per gallon in June 2022, in the wake of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine earlier that year.

Scalise’s claim that “right now it’s in the $3s” is on somewhat more solid ground than his other remarks. Sixteen states, including Scalise’s home state of Louisiana, had a Thursday state average gas price below $4 per gallon, per AAA. But that left 34 states and the District of Columbia with an average above $4 per gallon; again, the national average was $4.30.

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