Chairman Smith on CPI Report: Core Inflation Today Is Less Than Half At Same Time Under Joe Biden

Core inflation registered at 2.9 percent, less than half of the 6.0 percent at the same time during the Biden presidency.

WASHINGTON, D.C. - Ways and Means Committee Chairman Jason Smith (MO-08) issued the following statement after the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) released the Consumer Price Index (CPI) report for May 2026:

"Affordability is the top concern for millions of working families, farms, and small businesses, and the recent increase in gas prices has driven inflation higher. The temporary increase will come back down as tensions ease in the Middle East, and there are reasons to be optimistic prices will return to historic norms very quickly. Core inflation today is less than half what core inflation was at the same period in Joe Biden's disastrous presidency, even after accounting for volatility in global markets. Republicans in Congress knew that working families needed help after Joe Biden's 21 percent inflation, which is why we delivered historic tax refunds and bigger paychecks through pro-family, pro-worker tax cuts like No Tax on Tips, No Tax on Overtime, No Tax on Social Security, bigger Child Tax Credit, and the doubled standard deduction. This is tax relief for real working families. Nearly 70 percent of tax filers who got a tax cut made less than $100,000, and the percentage of all income taxes paid by the top 1 percent actually increased as a result of the Working Families Tax Cuts."