The Dictatorship

Inflation increases stretch into 3rd month with gas prices driving costs higher

Published

2 hours ago

June 11, 2026

Inflation increases stretch into 3rd month with gas prices driving costs higher

WASHINGTON (AP) — Rising gas prices pushed inflation to its highest level in three years last month, a headache for the Federal Reserve and a potential political challenge for the Trump administration as midterm elections near.

Consumer prices rose 4.2% in May from a year earlier, the Labor Department said Wednesday, up from 3.8% in April and the third straight monthly increase. On a monthly basis, prices rose 0.5% last month, after big gains of 0.6% in April and 0.9% in March.

Prices have now risen faster than wages for several months, pressuring many Americans’ finances and causing consumers to take a decidedly dim view of the economy. Families are dipping into savings to maintain their spending, and more people are falling behind on their credit card bills. Large retailers say they have also noticed changes in customer behavior, like buying smaller amounts of gas during visits to the pump.

As the daytime high temperature soars into the 80s, a United States Postal Service postman keeps cool by standing in the shade of a gasoline station sign posting the per-gallon prices for the various grades of fuel available Thursday, June 4, 2026, in central Denver. (AP Photo/David Zalubowski)

Inflation is now well above the Federal Reserve’s 2% target, which it has surpassed for more than five years. New Fed chair Kevin Warsh will preside over his first policy meeting next week, when the central bank is expected to keep its key interest rate unchanged. But the Fed is also likely to change the statement it issues after each meeting to remove a suggestion that its next move could be to lower rates. With inflation proving stubborn, financial markets expect the Fed could instead raise rates by the end of the year.

When the Fed lifts rates, over time it can make mortgages, auto loans, and business borrowing more expensive.

Outside energy costs, price increases last month were not as dramatic, a sign that sharply higher inflation hasn’t yet spread throughout the economy. Should the Iran was end and oil and gas prices decline, headline inflation could begin to cool. Gas prices have fallen this month, though they remain elevated.

Excluding the volatile food and energy categories, core prices rose at a more modest pace. On a monthly basis, they climbed just 0.2%, down from a 0.4% gain in April. Compared with a year ago, they have rise 2.9%, up from 2.8% in April.

President Donald Trump praised the inflation report in comments to reporters Wednesday, saying, “the numbers were great” and “I love it.”

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He said the inflation data was good because it showed energy prices were a huge driver of rising costs — the government said they accounted for more than 60% of the monthly increase — and he suggested inflation would ease “as soon as this war is over.”

However, the U.S. launched more airstrikes against Iran on Wednesday, and Trump said more were coming, as Tehran fired back at countries in the region.

Crude prices shot back above $90 a barrel on the violent exchange of fire.

Still, many goods and services rose in price last month: Clothing costs increased 0.3% and are 4.8% more expensive than a year ago. Airline fares, pushed higher by pricier jet fuel, jumped 2.7% just in May and are nearly 27% higher than a year ago. Electricity prices rose 0.6% in May and are up 5.9% in the past year.

Grocery prices were tamer in May compared with previous months, rising just 0.1% from April. Still, they are up 2.7% from a year ago and have risen sharply since the pandemic.

“I don’t think we’re anywhere near out of the woods yet,” Omair Sharif, chief economist at Inflation Insights, said. Price increases “were stronger under the hood.”

When the cost of nearly everything is rising, economists call it inflation. Even if paychecks also rise, inflation typically leads people feel like it’s harder to make ends meet, and it often becomes a major political issue.

Sharif and other economists point out that the cost of services, including child care, home health care, and dental services are still rising much more quickly than is consistent with the Fed’s 2% inflation target.

Bill Adams, chief U.S. economist at Fifth Third Commercial Bank, attributed some of the gain to a crackdown on immigration, which has likely forced many employers in those industries to raise wages.

Inflation had been cooling before Trump imposed sweeping tariffs in April 2025, which lifted the costs of many goods. Prices have since surged after the Iran war made oil and gas more expensive, making affordability a key political issue.

Small businesses are struggling with higher costs, some of which they are passing on in the form of higher prices. Others have slowed hiring or even cut jobs.

Beth Benike, the founder of Oronoco, Minnesota-based Busy Baby, said her small company was hit hard by tariffs last year and is now struggling with higher shipping costs stemming from more expensive fuel. The company sells silicon placemats and toys that attach to high chairs and strollers.

Sales have declined as inflation has worsened, and Benike recently reduced one full-time employee to part-time hours. She said that more of her customers are now grandparents of newborns, rather than the parents.

“Grandparents have a little more disposable income than the generation that’s having babies,” she said.

Gas prices rose in May because of Iran’s closure of the Strait of Hormuz, which has choked off about a fifth of the world’s oil supply. Prices at the pump rose, on average, from about $4.04 in mid-April to $4.49 in mid-May, according to the Energy Information Administration.

They have since fallen back to $4.16 on average nationwide, according to AAA, which could lead to a cooler inflation reading in June. That doesn’t mean gas prices are not prominent in the minds of most Americans. A gallon of gas has hovered above $4 a gallon since March.

Major retail chains have discounted prices to accommodate customers who are watching their spending more closely.

Dollar General is expanding the number of items that cost $1 or less, including frozen food. The shift has come with shoppers swapping out favored retailers for dollar stores.

“When that (gas) price hits that $4 mark and then crosses it and then sustains for a while, you start to see that trade-in come in and you start to see that our core customer needs us most,” Dollar General CEO Todd Vasos said this month.

Tomatoes await customers on the shelves of a supermarket in New York on Tuesday, May 26, 2026. (AP Photo/Matt Sedensky)

Amber Greenwell, executive director of the America First Credit Union’s charitable foundation, based in Ogden, Utah, says the cost of gas, housing and groceries have risen sharply in her state and much of the west in the past year. Her organization organizes food and diaper drives in the six states where the credit union operates.

“There is substantial growth in families who need more food resources as well as diaper resources,” she said.

Stubbornly high inflation has shifted the debate among Fed policymakers, who had signaled at the start of the year that they were inclined to cut their key rate twice more this year. Now, more officials are saying they expect the Fed’s next move will likely be a hike rather than a cut.

Despite higher inflation, the job market appears to be improving, with hiring increasing to a healthy level in Mayand the economy is still growing. These positive signs suggest the Fed doesn’t need to cut rates to stimulate growth and hiring. They also signal that the Fed’s rate isn’t so high that it is weighing on the economy. Yet some officials want rates to cool growth a bit, because that can bring down inflation.

___

AP Writers Josh Boak and Anne D’Innocenzio contributed to this report. D’Innocenzio contributed from New York.

The Dictatorship

Court denies request to immediately block DOJ ‘slush fund’

Published

9 minutes ago

June 11, 2026

Blue Light Newsroom

Court denies request to immediately block DOJ ‘slush fund’

Jun. 10, 2026, 6:14 PM EDT

A federal judge in Washington has denied a bid Wednesday brought by a watchdog group to immediately block the Justice Department’s “anti-weaponization” fund, for now choosing to trust the department’s assertions that it is not moving forward with the fund.

U.S. District Judge Richard Leon ruled immediately, denying Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington’s request for a temporary restraining order that would have blocked the Department of Justice from taking steps to create the fund.

Throughout the 30-minute hearing, the DOJ reiterated that the administration was not moving forward with the nearly $1.8 billion fund, which seeks to compensate individuals who allege they have been politically targeted or victimized by the DOJ.

Andrew Block, the only lawyer present for the government, repeatedly cited Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche’s June 2 congressional testimonyin which he said the administration was “not moving forward” with plans to create the fund.

Leon indicated he agreed with the DOJ’s position that the case appeared to be moot, saying he was not persuaded there was an issue for the court to decide regarding the creation of the fund. He issued a stern warning to the DOJ, saying, “Don’t play possum with this court!” — meaning he does not want to be deceived.

The plaintiffs argued Blanche’s testimony did not amount to an official cancellation. Nikhel Sus, CREW’s attorney, said Blanche “refused to memorialize that rescission,” or in other words, put it in writing. Sus said that was “highly unusual.” Leon responded, “This whole case is highly unusual to say the least.”

Leon asked the government twice why they would not just rescind the order that established the fund. Block responded, “I don’t know,” and pointed again to Blanche’s public statements about the fund’s future.

Both Leon and Sus raised the issue of Trump’s continued public defense of the fund. “It can still be an important issue and also not moving forward,” Block said. “That isn’t a direction to move forward with the fund.”

Although Leon rejected CREW’s bid for an immediate block, he indicated he is still considering its request for a longer-term block against the fund.

A block order from a separate federal judge in Virginia remains in effect until at least Friday.

Fallon Gallagher is a legal affairs reporter for MS NOW.

The Dictatorship

Trump is accelerating our Social Security insolvency crisis

Published

9 minutes ago

June 11, 2026

Blue Light Newsroom

Jun. 10, 2026, 5:50 PM EDT

The date when Social Security’s trust fund is expected to run out of money just got bumped up. The fund is now projected to empty in 2032according to a new report released by Social Security’s trustees.

The new depletion date isn’t an earth-shaking change — it’s only a quarter earlier than the estimate in last year’s report. But it illustrates how President Donald Trump’s policies are degrading a program he promised to never jeopardize — and accelerating an approaching crisis in how our government will assist the elderly and disabled.

The report names three factors that contributed to the earlier insolvency date. One is a declining fertility rate, but the other two drivers can be traced back to Trump: a drop in immigration into the country, and the “substantial effect” of the tax policies in the One Big Beautiful Bill he signed last summer.

Trump’s acceleration of the program’s insolvency comes atop his assaults on the program’s administrative capacities.

Reduced immigration during Trump’s second term — especially when coupled with a declining fertility rate — strains Social Security because the program is funded through payroll taxes. Those come out of people’s paychecks, and fewer workers supporting an aging population means the program receives less revenue. Indeed, Social Security already has been tapping its trust fund for the better part of the past two decades because the program’s costs have exceeded its cash income. And as the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities pointed out last yearlast year’s tax cuts were a boon to the rich but a bust for the solvency of the Social Security trust fund.

To be clear, if the fund is depleted, Social Security won’t go belly up. Benefits will continue to be paid out, but there will be a large drop in the amount. The Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget estimates that the “average monthly cut would total $500, which is more than what the average retired household spends on groceries each month.”

That would be a huge blow to the budgets of many older Americans. Social Security is a major source of income for most retirees, and roughly 40% of beneficiaries over the age of 65 rely on it for most of their income. And it would mark the destabilization of the sole source of retirement security for most Americans that is supposed to be insulated from ups and downs — unlike 401K plans. As the CBPP has pointed outSocial Security is “most workers’ only source of guaranteed retirement income that is not subject to investment risk or financial market fluctuations.”

Trump’s acceleration of the program’s insolvency comes atop his assaults on the program’s administrative capacities. His cuts to the Social Security Administration have left offices understaffedincreased wait timesand reduced quality of customer service.

Ultimately, Trump is exacerbating a colossal social safety net problem that predates him, and the trust fund will hit dire straits after he has left office. Democrats need to have clear plans for shoring up the program and making it robust for the future — which will require not being sheepish about taxes as a tool for renewing the social contract. And when Republicans try to claim that they, too, are champions of Social Security, all Democrats need to do is point to the truth.

Zeeshan Aleem is a writer and editor for MS NOW. He primarily writes about politics and foreign policy.

The Dictatorship

Wednesday’s Mini-Report, 6.10.26

Published

9 minutes ago

June 11, 2026

Blue Light Newsroom

Today’s edition of quick hits.

* The latest from Northern Ireland: “The family of a man who lost an eye in a knife attack appealed for calm on Wednesday after the incident triggered a wave of anti-immigrant violence in Belfast overnight, with masked men burning families out of their homes and torching vehicles. The appeal ‌came as a Sudanese man appeared in court charged with attempted murder and as British Prime Minister Keir Starmer and politicians in Northern Ireland condemned the violence by ‘masked thugs’ that had targeted ethnic minorities.”

* In related news: “The British government hit out at X owner Elon Musk Wednesday, accusing him of whipping up tensions online ahead of disorder in Belfast.”

* The tenuous state of a dubious ceasefire: “Trump said the U.S. is going to hit Iran ‘hard’ today when pressed by reporters in the Oval Office about his statement earlier that Tehran will ‘pay the price’ for taking ‘too long’ to reach a peace agreement. ‘Well, we’re going to be attacking them and attacking them very hard, resuming bombing,’ he said.”

* The latest casualty figures from Lebanon: “Israel’s military offensive in Lebanon has killed at least 3,666 people, including 131 healthcare workers, and injured more than 11,300 since the U.S. and Israel began their war with Iran in late February, the Lebanese health ministry reported yesterday.”

* The changing nature of modern warfare: “Ukraine is wreaking havoc on unarmored trucks and trains in the battlefield’s rear, using drones with upgraded engines and batteries, integrated Starlink communication systems and new artificial-intelligence capabilities. The ramped-up attacks are causing fuel shortages, complicating troop rotations and reducing Russian military activity on the front.”

* This seems like a reasonable request: “Democrats on the House Intelligence Committee demanded Wednesday that Bill Pulte, President Donald Trump’s controversial pick for acting director of national intelligence, submit to a full security check before assuming the post, including an examination of his financial holdings and foreign contacts.”

* Some market trends can’t be stopped despite the White House’s best efforts: “Even as President Donald Trump boosts coal over clean energy, solar power is hitting new milestones in the U.S. and remains the leading source of new power. Data released Wednesday by global energy think tank Ember, along with a report by the Solar Energy Industries Association and analytics firm Wood Mackenzie, show the continued growth of solar and decline of coal in the United States despite federal policy. In May, for the first time, solar supplied more of the nation’s electricity than coal, or 12.8%, Ember said.”

* A bizarre schedule for a nonemergency vanity project: “Federal officials are laying more groundwork to begin construction on President Donald Trump’s planned 250-foot-tall triumphal arch, sharing additional documents that detail the project’s scope and an aggressive timetable for potentially completing work before Trump’s term ends. According to National Park Service documents posted this month, the administration envisions 20 hours per day of construction on the arch, year-round, in hopes of completing the project within two to three years.”

See you tomorrow.

Steve Benen is a producer for “The Rachel Maddow Show,” the editor of MaddowBlog and an MS NOW political contributor. He’s also the bestselling author of “Ministry of Truth: Democracy, Reality, and the Republicans’ War on the Recent Past.”