Does the President control gas prices?
Prices have risen and fallen under presidents of both parties since 1970. Here's what our data shows across administrations — and what non-partisan sources say a president can and can't actually do.
Prices rose and fell under both parties
Here is the EIA’s national average for regular gasoline since 1970, with each presidential term marked. The pattern is the point: prices climbed and dropped under presidents of both parties, and the biggest moves line up with global events — not with who was in the White House. Toggle Adjusted for inflation to compare eras in constant 2025 dollars.
Source: U.S. Energy Information Administration, annual U.S. average for regular gasoline (our database). Bands mark presidential terms by full calendar years; the January transitions are approximated by annual averages.
| President | Party | Years | Start | End | Change |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Nixon | R | 1970–1974 | $0.34 | $0.37 | +9% |
| Ford | R | 1974–1977 | $0.52 | $0.58 | +12% |
| Carter | D | 1977–1981 | $0.62 | $1.18 | +92% |
| Reagan | R | 1981–1989 | $1.32 | $0.88 | −33% |
| George H. W. Bush | R | 1989–1993 | $0.96 | $1.08 | +12% |
| Clinton | D | 1993–2001 | $1.07 | — | — |
| George W. Bush | R | 2001–2009 | — | — | — |
| Obama | D | 2009–2017 | — | — | — |
| Trump | R | 2017–2021 | — | — | — |
| Biden | D | 2021–2025 | — | — | — |
| Trump | R | 2025–2026 | — | — | — |
Read down the last column and there’s no partisan pattern: prices rose sharply under Democrat Jimmy Carter and Republican George W. Bush alike, and fell under Republican Ronald Reagan and Democrat Barack Obama alike. The change is nominal (not inflation-adjusted), measured between each term’s first and last full year — a rough lens, but the absence of a clean party signal is the point. The why is in the economics, below.
What actually sets the price
Crude oil is most of the price. The single biggest component of what you pay is the cost of crude oil — about 51% of the retail price of regular gasoline in 2025, with refining, distribution and taxes making up the rest, per the EIA. [1] And crude is a globally traded commodity: its price is set by world supply and demand, OPEC+ output decisions, and geopolitics — not by U.S. policy. As UC Berkeley economist Severin Borenstein puts it, even America’s own oil output is “no protection at all against high oil and gasoline prices,” because that oil sells at the world price. [2]
Global events drive the big swings. The largest moves in the chart above track world events, not inaugurations: the 2008 financial crisis and the demand boom before it, the collapse in demand during the 2020 pandemic, and the 2022 jump after Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. [10] Refinery outages and the seasonal switch to summer-blend gasoline move prices too — again, regardless of who is in office. [1]
The levers a president has — and their real limits
A president isn’t powerless. But the available tools are marginal, slow, or temporary — they nudge prices, they don’t set them.
The Strategic Petroleum Reserve — temporary. A president can order releases from the SPR to add supply and take some pressure off prices. But the relief is short-lived: the Congressional Research Service notes a release “provides some temporary relief from rising prices,” and that “high prices alone are not an authorized circumstance to trigger a release.” [3]
Leasing and permitting — slow. A president can open or restrict federal drilling, but output responds with long lags: the CRS notes new federal leases “may take nearly 10 years” to reach production. [4] In practice, U.S. crude production has climbed to record after record under presidents of both parties — reaching 13.6 million b/d in 2025 — and drilling tracks the oil price more than the White House: as oil prices fell that year, the rig count fell with them. [5]
Sanctions and diplomacy — at the margin. Sanctions and trade policy can shift global supply a little. The CRS estimated U.S. sanctions on Iran, Russia and Venezuela affected roughly 3–4% of global petroleum supply — but found the losses were largely “counterbalanced by increased production and exports” from the U.S., Russia and other countries. [6]
Blend waivers — small and regional. A president can issue emergency waivers to allow higher-ethanol E15 to be sold during summer. The effect is modest: E15 typically runs about 3–10¢ cheaper than E10 and is sold at fewer than 2% of U.S. stations. [7]
Too much credit, too much blame
The evidence cuts against both political reflexes equally. Presidents tend to get too much credit when prices fall and too much blame when they rise. As GasBuddy analyst Patrick DeHaan put it to FactCheck.org, “it wasn’t President Obama’s fault then, and it’s not President Trump’s fault now.” [8] A PolitiFact review of the long record reached the same conclusion — that movements in gas prices “have little to do with who’s president” — noting the pump price hit both a high near $4.11 a gallon (2008) and a low near $1.07 (2001) under the same president, George W. Bush. [9] The 2026 price spike is the latest illustration — a geopolitical supply shock, not a policy choice.
Presidents and gas prices, answered
- Does the president control gas prices?
- Not really. Most of what you pay for gasoline is set by the price of crude oil, which trades on a global market driven by worldwide supply and demand, OPEC+ decisions, and geopolitics — forces no U.S. president controls. The EIA reports crude oil alone made up about 51% of the retail price of regular gasoline in 2025. A president has a few real but limited and slow-acting levers, but day-to-day prices are dominated by the global oil market.
- What can a president actually do about gas prices?
- A few things, all marginal or slow. Releasing oil from the Strategic Petroleum Reserve can ease prices temporarily, though the Congressional Research Service notes the relief is short-lived. Changing federal leasing or permitting affects production only with long lags (the CRS notes new federal leases may take nearly 10 years to reach production), sanctions shift global supply only at the margin, and emergency blend waivers (like summer E15) are small and regional.
- Why do gas prices rise and fall so much?
- Because crude oil prices do. Crude is the largest single component of the pump price and is set globally, so wars, recessions, OPEC+ output decisions, and demand shifts move it regardless of U.S. policy. The biggest swings of the last two decades lined up with global events: the 2008 financial crisis, the 2020 pandemic demand collapse, and the 2022 surge after Russia's invasion of Ukraine.
- Did a particular president cause prices to go up or down?
- Gasoline prices have risen and fallen under presidents of both parties, mostly tracking global events rather than who was in office. Fact-checkers across administrations have found that presidents get too much credit when prices fall and too much blame when they rise — as one fuel-price analyst quoted by FactCheck.org put it, it wasn't one president's fault then and isn't another's now.
Where the claims come from
- [1]U.S. EIA, “Factors affecting gasoline prices” (Gasoline explained) — retail price components
- [2]Severin Borenstein, “Oil and Gasoline 101,” Energy Institute at Haas, UC Berkeley (Jul 15, 2024)
- [3]Congressional Research Service, R46355, “The Strategic Petroleum Reserve: Background, Authorities, and Considerations” (May 13, 2020)
- [4]Congressional Research Service, R46537, “Revenues and Disbursements from Oil and Natural Gas Leases on Onshore Federal Lands”
- [5]U.S. EIA, Today in Energy — U.S. crude oil production set a record of 13.6 million b/d in 2025 (Mar 31, 2026)
- [6]Congressional Research Service, R46213, “Oil Market Effects from U.S. Economic Sanctions: Iran, Russia, Venezuela”
- [7]U.S. EIA, “New EPA ruling expands sale of 15% ethanol blended motor gasoline,” Today in Energy
- [8]FactCheck.org, Robert Farley, “Who’s to Blame for Higher Gas Prices?” (May 25, 2018)
- [9]PolitiFact (Gabrielle Settles), “Gas prices peaked under Bush, but they don’t correlate with who’s in office” (Oct 25, 2021)
- [10]FactCheck.org, “Gasoline Prices Up Due to Global Supply-Demand Issues, Russian Invasion of Ukraine” (Jul 2022)
Price data throughout is from the U.S. Energy Information Administration and held in our own database. Inflation-adjusted figures use the BLS Consumer Price Index (CPI-U), constant 2025 dollars.