The message for voters seems to be that if you think things are bad now, Republicans at the wheel would be much worse: My colleague Lauren Gambino has this look at how the president is attempting to tackle inflation as the clock runs down on the midterms. That he is focused on the crisis back home while on tour in Asia would appear to back up his assertion last week that inflation was his “ top domestic priority”.Ĭritics have been quick to point out that, last summer, Biden and acolytes including treasury secretary Janet Yellen were insistent that high inflation would likely only be temporary.īut it has continued to spiral, with the annual inflation rate still close to a 40-year high according to figures earlier this month. With his own approval ratings at the lowest point of his presidency, Biden is under pressure to try to reverse the situation and avoid Democrats losing control of one, or both chambers of Congress ion November’s midterms. In response to a reporter’s question specifically about a recession, Biden said he did not think it was “inevitable”. This is going to take some time,” Biden told reporters in Tokyo. There was little comfort for him in a bleak new CBS poll released Monday that finds 69% of the country thinks the economy is bad, and 77% saying they’re “pessimistic” about the cost of goods and services in the coming months. Joe Biden is warning Americans that the fight against inflation is “going to be a haul”, and that relief for soaring prices of goods, services and especially gasoline is unlikely to be immediate.īut the president, speaking in Tokyo earlier today as he launched a new trade deal with 12 Indo-Pacific nations, told reporters that he doesn’t believe a recession is “inevitable”.īiden is acutely aware that the inflation crisis is uppermost in voters’ minds ahead of November’s midterm elections.