“Shark Tank” co-star Kevin O’Leary said inflation data published on Wednesday will hurt President Joe Biden’s chances of getting reelected.
Inflation remained high as the consumer price index (CPI), a broad measure of the prices of everyday goods, increased 3.4% on an annual basis in April compared to 3.5% in March, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics. O’Leary on “Fox & Friends” said this data will likely ensure that the Federal Reserve will not lower interest rates in 2024 and voters will not appreciate these negative economic metrics. (RELATED: More Americans Maxing Out Credit Cards And Failing To Make Payments Than During Pandemic)
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“It guarantees that, in my opinion, the Fed will not lower rates at all for the rest of this year and that’s not what you want if you’re the incumbent,” O’Leary said. “Politically, it looks like this happened. Inflation data, you can be 20/20 in terms of looking backwards. We poured a lot of money into the economy during the pandemic and that turned out to be the right thing to do to avoid a depression. But then we kept going and probably put around $2 trillion too much in, Inflation Reduction Act did not reduce inflation. In fact, it was inflationary as we can see with these numbers. This is a nasty report.”
“Unfortunately the numbers don’t lie,” O’Leary continued. “This is manifesting itself in problems, inflation numbers around food, protein notably, gasoline and housing. Those are bad metrics when you’re at the voting poll. I don’t know what is going to happen, you want the Fed to cut rates and talk about 2% and none of that is happening. These are not good news for the current administration. Not at this time in the election cycle. These are nasty. There’s no other way to describe them.”
Inflation peaked at 9% under Biden in June 2022 after increasing from 1.4% year-over-year in January 2021, and it has not fallen below 3% since then. Elevated inflation is weighing heavily on Biden’s reelection prospects, with around 49% of voters surveyed by the Financial Times and the University of Michigan’s Ross School of Business saying they believe his policies have damaged the economy.
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