President Donald Trump said Monday that a lack of refineries, particularly in Russia and California, is influencing gasoline prices, not the Strait of Hormuz.
Trump commented on gas prices twice on Monday. First, he referenced them in a Truth Social post, and later he discussed them with reporters on the South Lawn of the White House ahead of his departure for Joint Base Andrews.
“What’s driving up Gasoline is no longer the Strait of Hormuz, because Record Numbers of Barrels are coming out now on an almost daily basis, but the word, ‘Refineries,’ where Russia’s are being blown up by Ukraine, and where ours are being closed up, in Blue States, like California, by the Dumocrats,” he said in a post in the early afternoon.
He was asked about Russian oil refineries a few hours later before boarding Marine One.
“We’ve talked about it, we have, and I think they’re slowing it down. But they are causing a lot of problems. The lack of refineries is the problem,” he said.
“We have tremendous amounts of oil coming out of the Hormuz Strait. We have that so good, but we have a lack of refineries because of the war, having to do mostly with diesel,” he added.
As the war with Iran got underway and passage of ships slowed through the Strait of Hormuz — where about one fifth of the world’s oil travels through — gas prices began to rise.
As NBC News reported, citing shipping data shared on Monday, “Gulf oil exporters topped prewar levels for about half of September.”
“The seven-day moving average for crude exports from the region was 18.3 million barrels per day on September 30, provisional data from Kpler showed, with volumes topping pre-war levels on 14 days in September,” the outlet added.
A gallon of regular gas averaged $4.37 as of Monday, according to the American Automobile Association (AAA), which is down about 11 cents from last Monday.