As oil prices started to climb in the first weeks of the U.S.-Israeli war on Iran, Fox personalities and others in right-wing media spun the resulting rise in gas prices by claiming they would be only temporary — Fox News host Jesse Watters suggested that prices would drop back down “within just a few weeks.” 

Now, as average gas prices nationwide continue to hover above $4 a gallon (which Fox Business host Jackie DeAnglis referred to in mid-March as her “uh-oh” number), some Fox personalities and guests continue to dismiss the “pain at the pump” under President Donald Trump’s war, sometimes comparing rising gas prices in response to Operation Epic Fury to global oil shocks caused by Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in 2022 during the Biden administration. However, many other figures across the right-wing media landscape are acknowledging that these rising prices are part of an “energy crisis that we've created” and which will likely continue to plague America after the war ends. 

As U.S. gas prices reached $4 per gallon on average on March 31, Fox News and Fox Business reacted to the milestone by echoing the White House’s claim that “as soon as Epic Fury is over, they project that gas prices will drop down to multi-year lows” — which has been disputed by experts, oil industry leaders, and even some analysts on Fox. Some network personalities and guests deflected by arguing that fuel prices under former President Joe Biden were worse than the current spike but failed to draw the distinction that U.S. gas prices in 2022 rose as a direct result of Russia's invasion of Ukraine, which Biden opposed, while current prices are a result of Trump’s decision to attack Iran. 

• On March 7, Fox Business host Larry Kudlow claimed that once the conflict is resolved, prices will go even lower than before the war, adding, “This country is not beholden to the blockade and Strait of Hormuz.” Kudlow claimed, “At the conclusion of Epic Fury,” oil prices “will probably drop into the mid-50s.” Three days later, he made a similar claim on Fox News: “Gas will move back to two and a half bucks, where it was before. … the United States, this country is not beholden to the blockade and Strait of Hormuz. It's the rest of the world's problem.” [Fox Business, Kudlow Weekend, 3/7/26; Fox News, America Reports, 3/10/26]
• Fox Business anchor Cheryl Casone suggested on March 9 that Trump would keep the conflict with Iran “short-term” because “America First is making sure we can afford our prices at home — our gas prices.”A few days later, Casone reassured viewers on Outnumbered that “oil prices will go down in weeks. Americans need to be patient and I think they are.” [Fox News, Fox & Friends First, 3/9/26; Fox News, Outnumbered, 3/11/26]
• On America Reports, Fox host Tomi Lahren claimed on March 11 that gas prices are seeing a “short spike” and that “a lot of folks in the base” feel better when they “hear the president talk.” Lahren: “This president is willing to take those arrows for the time being and explain to the American people this is going to be a short spike and then they are going to go back down. …He can do it all and it's going to be a short excursion. Every time I hear the president talk I certainly feel better, I know a lot of folks in the base do as well.” [Fox News, America Reports, 3/11/26]
• Fox News correspondent Bill Melugin: “I don't remember them being this concerned in June of 2022 when gas prices hit record highs. And back then, it was the Putin price hike.” [Fox News, America’s Newsroom, 3/11/26]
• Jesse Watters: “Gas prices are still lower today when we're at war with Iran than they were under Biden. Hopefully it's a small, quick price to pay to take out the nation's No. 1 sponsor of terror. Many Americans get it.” [Fox News, Jesse Watters Primetime, 3/11/26]
• Fox personalities and guests told viewers that spiking gas prices would be only a “short-term” impact of Trump’s war against Iran. Fox host Jesse Watters said, “There's going to be some short-term pain for American consumers until the Iranians are defanged, which we hope is within just a few weeks and oil drops back down to the 60s.” Fox Business’ Cheryl Casone declared, “If we have a short-term spike in gasoline prices, it will be short-lived. And many of the administration officials have repeatedly said that over and over. ... Listen to them.” Fox & Friends First co-host Todd Piro said on Fox Business that the price of gas could be “to the Republicans' benefit in the long run because, you know, this is a temporary blip.” [Media Matters, 3/12/26]
• A week before average gas prices topped $4 per gallon nationwide, former Trump economic adviser Stephen Moore said on Fox Business that as the price of crude “comes down, whether that's going to be in three days or three weeks or three months when the straits are open, then we will see a resumption of oil back in the $55 to $60 range and that's very, very bullish for markets.” [Fox Business, Varney & Co., 3/23/26]
• On The Bottom Line Moore continued his claim that prices would come down quickly like a “waterfall.” Moore: “When the price starts coming down it really comes down — I mean, you see like a waterfall happening. I am of the belief that we could within the next few months see the oil price back down to $50-60 a barrel, which is not $4 a gallon at the gas, it’s less than $3.” [Fox Business, The Bottom Line, 3/31/26]
• On Fox & Friends, Fox Business’ Taylor Riggs dismissed the current “pain at the pump” by pointing to “decade highs” under Biden and suggesting that this time high prices are “worth it.” Riggs said: “Gas prices are exactly where they were in 2022. That's where we are. We’re not at decade highs, we’re where we were during Biden‘s administration, and the left wasn't crying about that. In fact, they were gaslighting us and saying that the economy was great and like your feelings aren't real and gas isn't that bad. And actually suck it up. … I think this time people are saying OK, is it worth it? Is the battle worth fighting for? [Fox News, Fox & Friends, 4/1/26]
• On April 4, Fox’s Kayleigh McEnany said that gas prices during the Iran war are not “Biden high” and claimed that “from this temporary blip, we might get a non-nuclear Iran — the biggest threat on the globe really eradicated and the gas prices, by the way, coming down.” McEnany also said that we got “absolutely nothing” from “$5 a gallon gas prices under Biden.” [Fox News, Fox & Friends Weekend, 4/4/26]
• On One Nation with Brian Kilmeade, right-wing commentator and podcast host Danielle Pletka declared, “This is not the Iraq War. We are going in, we have a finite mission, and then we will be out and there will be no reason why gas prices will not settle down again very quickly.” Pletka is a senior fellow at the American Enterprise Institute. [Fox News, One Nation with Brian Kilmeade, 4/5/26]

• Appearing on right-leaning podcast The Shawn Ryan Show, former head of the National Counterterrorism Center Joe Kent, who resigned from the Trump administration in protest over the Iran war, expressed caution to host Shawn Ryan about long-term impacts of the conflict. Kent: “The amount of fertilizer that needs those petrochemicals that come out of the [Persian] Gulf, that rely on the Straits of Hormuz flowing freely, I mean, that's a major problem. … I think America, we can insulate ourselves to a certain extent. We're definitely going to feel it in terms of the inflation. We're already feeling it. The gas prices are back up. Like we're back in the Biden era again, unfortunately.” [Vigilance Elite, The Shawn Ryan Show, 3/26/26; The Associated Press, 3/18/26]
• Former Fox host Megyn Kelly warned on March 27 about the “energy crisis that we've created.” Kelly: “We haven't felt the full effect of what's happening in the oil market and the energy market yet. We're only feeling the initial tremors that the full pain will come just in time for summer vacations and the trip you were going to take with your family cross country in the station wagon to the Grand Canyon. Gas prices, trust me, as a newswoman, every year I've been doing this, 24 years now. … And if this thing is actually going to hit most over the course of the summer, this energy crisis that we've created, two months before they actually vote for the midterms.” [SiriusXM, The Megyn Kelly Show, 3/27/26]
• White nationalist streamer Nick Fuentes suggested midterm voters will turn on Republicans “when oil's $200 a barrel, when gas is $5 a gallon.” Fuentes said: “Iran doesn’t matter, the economy doesn't matter? Well, try that in the midterm elections. … Good luck with that. When oil's $200 a barrel, when gas is $5 a gallon, when mortgage rates are back over 6%, good luck telling those voters hey, but immigration's the only thing that matters. And if you disagree, you're a brown-coated, spiritually leftist Third Worldist.” [Rumble, America First with Nick Fuentes, 3/30/26]
• Conservative pundit Piers Morgan: “I just don't see any sign of a victory here. I see a lot of bombs going off, a lot of show of military might, but I also see the Iranians winning the economic war quite easily and quite devastatingly. You know, I'm looking at the markets, I'm looking at the oil production, gas production.” [YouTube, Piers Morgan Uncensored, 3/30/26]
• On Steve Bannon’s War Room podcast, former Fox News and Newsmax host Eric Bolling said: “Oil traders and not speculators, the actual guys trading the oil, the people I talk to, the refiners, the petroleum transporters, the producers — they believe higher prices are in the cards going forward.” [Real America’s Voice, War Room, 3/31/26]
• Manosphere podcaster Amrou Fudl, known online as Myron Gaines: “We have lost this war” and Iran has “all the leverage” because “they’re keeping the strait closed and quite frankly, they can keep it closed, have gas prices go through the fucking roof. The gulf states don’t respect us anymore. They don’t want us there.” [Rumble, The Debrief with MyronGainesX, 4/1/26; Southern Poverty Law Center, 7/29/25]
• Fox Business host Dagen McDowell expressed frustration that “everything is headed in the wrong direction” because “we are the ones that kicked the hornet's nest.” McDowell: Trump “needs to talk to the American people because their gas prices are high and diesel prices are soaring. People are feeling the crunch. They voted for President Trump to make their lives better and more affordable. Right now, everything is headed in the wrong direction. He needs to talk about that and stop acting like oh, it's not our problem. We are the ones that kicked the hornet's nest.” [Fox Business, The Big Money Show, 4/1/26]
• MAHA influencer Alex Clark posted an image of what it cost to fill her tank on Instagram Stories with the caption “What are these prices?!” [Instagram, 4/1/26]
• On Fox’s Special Report, oil industry guest Kevin Book directly challenged Trump’s claim that gas prices will bounce back after the war. “What is happening right now is a very, very significant interruption in the global supply system,” Book said. “Getting back to a normal supply and demand balance and normal inventories can take months. … I think we'll see gasoline prices going up from here.” [Fox News, Special Report with Bret Baier, 4/2/26]
• Discussing issues of affordability and the midterm elections, Fox contributor Kat Timpf said, “ I think right now you are being asked to make sacrifices, gas is expensive, OK — there are people that are straight up saying alright, well, deal with it. And I don't think that's good messaging going into this for the GOP.” [Fox News, The Five, 4/3/26]
• On The Big Weekend Show, Fox senior national correspondent Rich Edson said high gas prices “could be long-lasting not only because of the bottleneck in the Strait of Hormuz, but also Iran has destroyed a lot of infrastructure in the region, so that's going to keep gas prices elevated for some time.” [Fox News, The Big Weekend Show, 4/5/26]