Americans dogged by persistently high prices are finally getting signs of relief as inflation has slowly but steadily cooled over the past 12 months — but that is no because of President Joe Biden, in line with Republican presidential candidate Chris Christie.
“Inflation has began to retreat, I believe almost exclusively due to [Federal Reserve] policy,” Christie, the previous governor of Latest Jersey, said Tuesday on CNBC’s “Last Call.”
“We’re definitely not seeing any reduction in spending by the Biden administration, they usually’re still printing a lot of free money,” Christie said.
The Fed will not be entirely faultless, he said. “They could have waited too long to do what they were doing on rates, and subsequently had to lift them rather more quickly,” said Christie, “and I can be critical of that.”
But Biden and his predecessor, former President Donald Trump, each deserve the lion’s share of the blame attributable to their profligate spending, the previous governor argued.
“In the long run, the explanation for that is Joe Biden and his spending and Donald Trump and his spending during his time within the White House,” said Christie, whose presidential primary campaign has been aggressively critical of Trump.
The Biden administration has put his inflation-fighting efforts front and center in his first term in office. He championed a sweeping spending bill in 2022 dubbed the Inflation Reduction Act and has taken credit for the easing of the inflation rate since its passage.
But recent polls show majorities of registered voters disapprove of how Biden has handled the economy and inflation particularly, exposing a significant weakness as he seeks reelection in 2024.
Christie, making a pitch for his candidacy on CNBC, vowed to rein in federal spending, which he argues is at the basis of U.S. inflation woes.
Fed policymakers, in turn, will begin to lower rates after they see that the chief branch will not be burning through trillions of dollars in deficit spending every 12 months, he said.
“I’m willing to say no to more federal spending,” Christie said.
He also wouldn’t say if he would reappoint Fed Chair Jerome Powell, whose term expires in May 2026. “It will depend on how he does from here out,” Christie said.