President Trump says gas prices aren’t that high. Americans don’t agree

President Donald Trump on Thursday dismissed concerns about a sharp jump in gas prices due to the Iran war, even though the latest polls showed most U.S. voters blame him for soaring pump prices.

“Well, it’s not that high,” President Trump told reporters at the White House after being asked how long Americans will continue to see higher gas prices.

President Trump said those prices were not as high as expected as a result of the war, and said the purpose of the war was to deny Iran the ability to produce nuclear weapons.

“Gasoline prices have dropped significantly over the last three or four days,” President Trump said. Gasoline prices have increased 49% since the beginning of 2026, according to prices tracked by AAA. Prices fell an average of 7 cents per gallon after a two-week ceasefire was announced last week.

A Quinnipiac University national poll of registered voters released Wednesday found that 65% of respondents blame President Trump “a lot” or “somewhat” for the recent rise in gas prices.

The poll found that just 38% of respondents approve of President Trump’s handling of the economy, matching the previous lows he reached in March and October 2025 during both of his White House terms.

The survey of 1,028 self-identified registered voters has a margin of error of 3.8 percentage points.

Gasoline prices have skyrocketed since the US and Israel began their war against Iran on February 28th.

At the beginning of 2026, the average price of regular gasoline was just over $2.75 per gallon. The average price Thursday was $4.093 per gallon, according to AAA.

The average price of diesel fuel is now around $5.65 per gallon, up from just over $3.50 per gallon in January.

“The fact is, the stock market is up, everything is going very well. The big thing we had to do was make sure Iran didn’t have a nuclear weapon,” Trump said Thursday.

“Because if they want to talk about the problem, there’s going to be a problem,” he said.