Gas Prices Jump to Four-Year High on Iran War Jitters

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By Yuval Rosenberg and Michael Rainey

Good evening. House Republican infighting has created a mess for Speaker Mike Johnson, who was looking to accomplish several key agenda items this week, including a renewal of an important but controversial surveillance tool, progress toward funding for immigration enforcement and a farm bill. Republicans were forced to cancel votes planned for today, leaving those major pieces of legislation stalled with no clear path to passage. The White House reportedly sent a message to Capitol Hill saying that the Department of Homeland Security needs to be funded immediately, squeezing conservatives who have balked at elements of the GOP plan.

Here's what else is happening.

Gas Prices Soar to Four-Year High on Iran War Jitters

The price of gasoline has surged again amid the ongoing war with Iran, hitting an average of $4.18 a gallon on Tuesday, according to AAA. Analysts are blaming an impasse in peace talks between Iran and the United States for the 1.6% jump in a single day.

Gas prices are touching highs not seen since Russia invaded Ukraine in 2022 and are more than $1 higher than they were before the start of the war. In March, gasoline registered its largest monthly price increase in nearly 60 years.

The underlying cost of crude oil has risen, as well, though it has bounced around depending on the state of the war. In Tuesday trading, West Texas futures touched $100 per barrel for June delivery, and Brent futures moved above $110.

In related news, oil giant BP reported Tuesday that its profit more than doubled in the first quarter of 2026. "Given soaring energy costs the stellar performance from BP was anticipated," the Associated Press said, "yet it still exceeded the heightened expectations of industry analysts for both profit and revenue."

More pain at the pump? Some energy analysts think that the price of oil has been held in check by President Trump's repeated claims that the war with Iran is almost over, or that peace talks are going well. Those claims have been effective in keeping a lid on oil futures, which have remained close to $100 per barrel, even as the spot price of immediate purchase has soared closer to $140. But, as the war drags on, that may change.

"There's a day of reckoning coming," Dan Pickering, chief investment officer at Pickering Energy Partners, told Politico. Pickering said he expects to see a price shock that arrives with the summer driving season. "It will be painful because I can tell you that the stock market's ignoring this."

Rosemary Kelanic, director of the Middle East Program at the non-interventionist think tank Defense Priorities, says that Trump's efforts to hold back energy prices could backfire as oil producers sit on their hands. "By talking down the market so effectively, when the price spike becomes inevitable, it's going to hurt way worse because we'll have lost weeks or even months of time where producers could have been ramping up output," she told Politico.

Affordability Still a Top Concern for Americans

As gas prices continue to climb, new survey data from Gallup shows that inflation and high prices remain top concerns for American consumers.

Responding to an open-ended question about the most important financial problems facing their families, 31% of respondents named inflation and the high cost of living. Another 13% cited oil and gas prices, and an equal percentage said housing costs. Healthcare, cited by 8%, rounded out the list of the top four financial concerns.

Other financial issues received less attention. Just 6% named taxes as their main concern, with the state of the economy (2%), interest rates (2%) and Social Security (1%) also being mentioned by some respondents.

Worries about affordability continue to weigh on Americans' assessments of their current financial situations. A bit less than half (46%) of respondents said their situation is excellent or good, while about a third (35%) said it is fair and 19% said it is poor - the highest reading since 2011. A majority (55%) said their financial situation is getting worse - the highest percentage recorded in data going back to 2001.

"Americans' financial outlook in 2026 is ... historically poor," Gallup said. "While similar to last year's 53%, this is up from 47% in 2024 and marks the fifth consecutive year more Americans say their finances are worsening rather than improving."

The Gallup survey of 1,001 U.S. adults was conducted April 1-15,2026, with a margin of error of plus or minus 4 percentage points.

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Pentagon Asks Congress to Codify 'Department of War' Name

The Pentagon is asking Congress to codify its renaming of the Department of Defense to the Department of War.

President Trump signed an executive order in September instructing the Defense Department to restore the "Department of War" name, used until the 1940s, as a secondary option and allowing the use of titles such as "Secretary of War." Trump instructed the Pentagon to use these secondary names and pursue a permanent renaming. Congress has not approved the changes.

In a recent legislative proposal, the Pentagon estimated that the renaming has cost about $52 million, though the final tally will be available only after the changes are completed in the current fiscal year. The proposal said that the department took steps to implement the new name "in the most cost effective and non-invasive ways," including by using existing letterhead before making changes and updating signage via collective purchases.

The Congressional Budget Office had estimated early this year that Trump's executive order could cost anywhere from $10 million to $125 million, depending on how extensively the Department of War name is used.

The Pentagon request would involve approximately 7,600 changes to federal law. The legislative proposal said the request has "no significant impact" on the president's defense budget request for fiscal year 2027.

Trump is seeking a massive 42% increase in defense spending to $1.5 trillion.

Trump Administration Will Stop Paying for Fentanyl Test Strips

The Trump administration is reversing a policy that allowed federal money to pay for test strips that are used to determine if street drugs contain fentanyl or other contaminants.

The test strips, which reportedly cost about $1 apiece, are a common tool used to prevent overdoses and are frequently distributed at colleges, music festivals and other locations. The federal government has reportedly paid to supply the strips to states since 2021, but in a letter sent Friday to state health departments and other recipients, the federal Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration said the U.S. government would no longer provide funding for fentanyl test strips or any other substance test kits "intended for use by people using drugs." The letter was obtained by The New York Times.

"The sudden policy reversal bewildered and alarmed administrators of programs that have routinely handed out test strips for years, hoping to stave off overdoses and encourage people who use drugs to exercise more caution," the Times's Jan Hoffman reports. "The strips can be used to test drugs ranging from crack cocaine to anti-anxiety pills."

The change is the result of the Trump administration's shift away from "harm reduction" strategies and its contention that such measures encourage drug use. "To finally bring an end to this crisis and achieve the Great American Recovery, it is essential that the use of federal funding is aligned to common-sense public health strategies that focus on prevention, treatment, and long-term recovery," the new letter says.

A Trump executive order issued last July directed the secretary of health and human services to "ensure that discretionary grants issued by the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration for substance use disorder prevention, treatment, and recovery fund evidence-based programs and do not fund programs that fail to achieve adequate outcomes, including so-called 'harm reduction' or 'safe consumption' efforts that only facilitate illegal drug use and its attendant harm."

In a footnote, the administration's new notice says that the new prohibition "does not apply to law enforcement, emergency medical services, public health officials, or healthcare professionals using drug testing technologies in the regular course of discharging their professional duties, or as specifically authorized by the program statute."

Quote of the Day

"The corporatization of American hospitals means that our local hospitals and physicians have been replaced by mega-corporations that put quarterly earnings over quality care and grow larger simply for the sake of growing larger....

Simply put, hospitals are charging an insane amount for care. Hospital prices have skyrocketed 300 percent in just over two decades - more than any other sector of our economy. Hospital consolidation and mergers, that lead to ever-growing market power, are fueling the borderline extortionary prices hospitals charge patients. Today, there are forty-five hundred hospitals, and 2,000 of them have undergone a merger. The result is that today, 90 percent of hospital beds are part of a health system. The pace and scale of mergers have led to market concentration that puts patients at the mercy of hospital empires. When hospitals have no competition, it's no wonder that the sky seems to be the limit for prices."

− Republican House Ways and Means Committee Chairman Jason Smith, in his prepared opening remarks at a hearing Tuesday with hospital system CEOs. Read more about the hearing at Politico or The Hill.

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