Republican 2024 presidential candidate Chris Christie has blamed President Joe Biden for the current state of the economy, calling Biden "the Jimmy Carter of the 2020s."
The former New Jersey governor argued that everything in the market is currently "17% more expensive" than when the president took office in January 2021, adding that interest rates are at the highest they have been in 25 years. The current state of the economy, Christie claimed, has made it harder for people in the United States to make investments in their lives, such as buying a new car or home.
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"This guy is the Jimmy Carter of the 2020s," said Christie during an appearance on CNN. "And his inflation that he created, and don't take my word for it: Democratic economist former treasury secretary to Bill Clinton, Larry Summers, has said that Joe Biden created this inflation through his ridiculous spending."
Christie added that he had handled a troubled economy back when he was governor, and did it by balancing the budget and not raising taxes. The former New Jersey governor said that it is possible to fix the U.S. economy, but that doing so needs to be done by someone "who knows how to do it."
Christie's comments come after inflation fell to a 3% annual rate in June, as measured by the gauge favored by the Federal Reserve. It marks a 0.8 percentage point decline from the month before and the lowest reading since September 2021.
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The decrease in inflation was joked about this week by Biden, who joked that the falling inflation might get the attention of Republicans in Congress. The president's joke comes amid growing rumblings that Republicans in Congress will try to impeach Biden.
A poll released last month found that 72.5% of likely voters believe the United States is in decline both culturally and economically, compared to only 21.6% who do not believe so. When divided by political party, 91.7% of Republicans believe the country is in decline, compared to 5.8% who do not, while 50.7% of Democrats also believe the country is in decline, compared to 38.3% who do not.