mediamatters.org
Fox used California's climate policies to deflect from gas price spike driven by Trump’s war on Iran
Fox News and Fox Business coverage of rising gas prices nationwide has singled out California, blaming the state’s climate regulations for skyrocketing fuel costs while downplaying global oil shocks from the Trump administration’s war with Iran.On February 28, the United States and Israel launched strikes on Iran, opening what has quickly become a large-scale and open-ended conflict, started without congressional authorization, that has been widely criticized as an illegal and unconstitutional war of aggression. The U.S. has joined Israel in targeting Iranian leadership as well as civilian and military infrastructure, while President Donald Trump has signaled an explicit willingness to pursue regime change. These attacks have triggered Iranian retaliation, including efforts to restrict transit through the Strait of Hormuz, one of the world’s most critical oil chokepoints, helping drive a sharp increase in global crude prices and U.S. gas costs.Fox's coverage has largely echoed the Trump administration’s framing of the conflict and its economic fallout. Even when Fox has acknowledged that U.S. strikes on Iran have disrupted the global oil supply, that connection is not sustained. Instead, Fox’s coverage has dispersed attention about rising gas prices across a range of explanations, moving between domestic policy factors, claims that price increases will be temporary, and arguments that higher costs are a necessary “sacrifice.” Taken together, these talking points diffuse the link between Trump’s decision to launch the conflict against Iran and the resulting price spike, shifting scrutiny away from the source of the disruption.However, the focus on California serves a distinct narrative function — by emphasizing the state’s climate regulations, Fox networks depict a global, war-driven supply shock through a familiar domestic political lens, recasting climate policy as part of the problem behind high gas prices rather than a solution to it.
