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Over 7 days, Fox News spent only 1 minute covering rising diesel prices caused by Trump’s Iran war

Fox Business’ David Asman suggested “green goals” are to blame

Special Programs Climate & Energy

Written by Allison Fisher

Published

  • Diesel fuel, which essentially “powers a vast chunk of America's economy” including the agricultural sector, hit a national average of $5.50 a gallon on August 19 for the first time since the early months of President Donald Trump’s conflict with Iran. In the following seven days, Fox covered this significant milestone for just 1 minute — virtually ignoring a consequence of Trump’s actions in the Middle East which, along with high fertilizer costs also caused by the conflict, have acted like a “double whammy for farmers.” 

    The lack of coverage reflects the network's ongoing attempts to downplay the war’s impact on surging energy prices. Last month Fox dedicated a mere 15 minutes over a four-day period to reporting on rising gas prices climbing above $4 a gallon again and to deflecting from their root cause by blaming climate policy instead of Trump’s war.

    Axios reports the two main reasons that diesel prices are high and rising are restrictions on the Strait of Hormuz from the Iran war “and the Ukrainian attacks on Russian refineries that have prompted Moscow to reduce exports.” However, Fox Business’ David Asman suggested that green policies were to blame during Fox News’ only segment on rising diesel prices from August 19-26:

  • From the August 19, 2026, edition of Fox News' America Reports

    DAVID ASMAN (FOX BUSINESS ANCHOR): Another thing that has to be mentioned —- diesel oil is becoming a bigger and bigger problem for not just the United States but for the whole world. We have turned off a lot of the companies and a lot of the refineries that have worked on diesel oil because of green goals not only in the United States but of course specifically in Europe. And diesel is so much at the heart of what we do as a nation in order to produce things, particularly for agricultural products. So that's something to watch that crack spread as it’s called, the cost of turning oil into diesel has grown enormously.

  • Elevated fuel costs since the start of the war are already driving up grocery prices and other consumer goods. The average price of diesel in the United States was $5.62 a gallon as of August 27 compared to $3.71 a gallon a year ago, quickly approaching the record high of $5.82 a gallon reached in 2022 after Russia invaded Ukraine.

  • Methodology

    Media Matters searched transcripts in the SnapStream video database for all original programming on Fox News Channel for the terms “diesel” from August 19, 2026, when U.S. nationwide average diesel prices once again hit $5.50 a gallon, through August 26, 2026.

    We timed segments, which we defined as instances when diesel prices were the stated topic of discussion or when we found significant discussion of diesel prices. We defined significant discussion as instances when two or more speakers in a multitopic segment discussed the diesel prices with one another.

    We also timed mentions, which we defined as instances when a speaker mentioned diesel prices without another speaker in the segment engaging with the comment, and teasers, which we defined as instances when the anchor or host promoted a segment about diesel prices scheduled to air later in the broadcast.

    We rounded all reported times to the nearest minute.