Trump takes his inflation battle to gas retailers after his plot against the Fed runs aground—sets target for $2.50 a gallon

"The retailers must quickly react to this statement, and do what they know is right — DROP YOUR PRICE FOR OUR GREAT AMERICAN PEOPLE!"

President Trump is searching for a new target in his battle against the affordability crisis, and it seems he’s found one in gasoline retailers.

The price of gas increased 40.5% on a 12-month basis ending May 2026, with fuel oil also moving up 58.9%, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS). The increases came after the global oil supply was choked by the U.S. and Israel’s conflict with Iran—threatening supply routes out of the Middle East. With the conflict now seeming to be drawing toward a conclusion, oil prices have been coming down.

Gas prices, however, have remained elevated.

“Gasoline retailers must get their prices down, IMMEDIATELY!” Trump wrote in a post on Truth Social in the early hours of this morning. “They’re too high considering that oil is now at $68 a barrel, and heading south. The retailers must quickly react to this statement, and do what they know is right — DROP YOUR PRICE FOR OUR GREAT AMERICAN PEOPLE!”

Trump has attempted to shift market prices through the sheer force of his rage before.

Previously, the U.S. Federal Reserve was the target of his ire. The U.S. inflation rate now sits at 4.2%, according to the BLS, well above the Fed’s target of 2%.

Trump claimed that the Fed, under previous chairman Jerome Powell, was keeping the base rate far higher than it needed to be—blocking consumers from borrowing more cheaply and buying homes as a result. Trump went to extraordinary efforts to pressure the Fed into lowering, from launching criminal probes into Powell and Governor Lisa Cook, to outright insulting the chair’s intelligence.

Powell has since left the role. Trump’s nominee for his successor, Kevin Warsh, also did not lower rates in his first meeting chairing the Federal Open Market Committee (FOMC) earlier this month. It seems on this front, Trump’s attempt to blame high interest rates for curbing the economy has reached a dead end for now.

Enter the gas retailers.

“Gasoline retailers must get their prices down, IMMEDIATELY!” Trump wrote in a post on Truth Social in the early hours of this morning. “They’re too high considering that oil is now at $68 a barrel, and heading south. The retailers must quickly react to this statement, and do what they know is right — DROP YOUR PRICE FOR OUR GREAT AMERICAN PEOPLE!”

Trump also stated last night that there will be no “gauging.” Presumably, he meant to write “gouging,” a reference to the practice of raising prices to unfair levels during a time of crisis. He added that if retailers don’t begin to lower prices, “big problems lie ahead.” He even went as far as to insist that gas stations charge only $2.50 a gallon.

That would be quite a drop. The AAA reported that the current average price per gallon of regular gas is $3.85. That’s down from a month ago, when regular gas was at $4.36, but up from a year ago when it retailed for $3.19.

Supreme Court sting

Another motivation for Trump to turn his attention away from the central bank and toward his former campaign donors in the Big Oil sector is a Supreme Court decision from yesterday.

Justices ruled 5–4 on Monday that President Donald Trump was wrong to try ousting Fed Governor Lisa Cook last August because she didn’t receive due process. The ruling retained the Fed’s special status in the government that shields it from interference by the White House—now or in the future.

“Cook was entitled to notice and some opportunity to respond prior to her termination,” Chief Justice John Roberts wrote, adding that Trump’s argument that presidents should be able to remove a member of the Fed “at any time, for any reason, without any notice before, and without any judicial check” renders the “for-cause protection into little more than at-will employment.”

Roberts added that the central bank’s independence must be upheld not just in practice but also in belief among the rest of the world: “Not only the fact of independence but also the appearance of independence is key to the Federal Reserve’s design.”

While Trump had already been sniping at gas retailers, the Supreme Court’s ruling was a further blow to the White House’s bid to broadly control market prices—a matter all the more pressing as the midterms inch closer.

This story was originally featured on Fortune.com