At a rally in Wasilla on Tuesday, President Donald Trump and Republican U.S. Sen. Dan Sullivan said America’s war with Iran is worth the resulting increased cost of fuel and food for Americans.
“No matter what it is, it’s a small price to pay for stopping them from having a nuclear weapon,” Trump said of Iran.
Fuel prices have risen in Alaska and the United States at large since Trump began the Iran war alongside Israel on Feb. 28. According to the latest available state report, heating fuel prices in rural Alaska climbed to an average of $8 per gallon by August, up from $6.49 per gallon in January.
Sullivan has voted 14 times against War Powers Act resolutions that could limit or end American involvement in it.
Before the current war, Sullivan supported the Trump-ordered bombing of Iran last year and has advocated military action against the country.
Speaking on Tuesday in Wasilla, Sullivan said the best way to reduce fuel costs in Alaska is to produce more oil and gas locally, and he said Alaskans should re-elect him because national Democrats oppose oil and gas development.
“It’s important to remember this: the best way to address Alaska’s energy challenges is to produce more Alaskan energy by and for Alaskans,” Sullivan said.
“Ladies and gentlemen, the conflict in the Middle East is temporary. The true forever war is the national Democrats’ war against Alaska oil and gas and our jobs. That’s the forever war,” he said.
Sullivan, the incumbent Republican, is in a close race against Democratic challenger Mary Peltola, who has criticized Trump for starting the war and Sullivan for supporting it.
“We should be standing up to the president, and there have been many times where the Senate and the House have said no to the administration on wars. Where is our backbone?” Peltola said during an Anchorage forum on Oct. 8.
Peltola and Sullivan are in a four-person general election that also includes Dan J. Sullivan of Petersburg and Republican Gerald Heikes of Palmer.
Speaking on Tuesday, Trump said, “We’re very close to winning — I mean, we’ve — I think we’ve won the war because they will — Iran will not have a nuclear weapon, let me put it that way. That war is going to end very soon and when it does, your prices are going to come tumbling down. They already are.”
National and state data has not shown a significant decline in fuel prices over the past month, and consumer price inflation in September was 3.7%, up from August.
In a visit to Fairbanks earlier this month, Vice President J.D. Vance offered comments similar to the ones that Trump made this week, including statements to the effect that Democrats are the enemy.
Peltolta said it’s outrageous to call half of Americans an enemy.
“No American is my enemy. … No Republican is my enemy. No Democrat is my enemy. No Alaskan who is independent, nonpartisan, undeclared is my enemy,” Peltola said.
She seemed to also rebut a New York Times article stating that she once wished a local Planned Parenthood board member would die of a botched abortion: “I have not one person I wish ill will or malice or injustice to in all of Alaska and all of America. We are all in this together. There is no reason to create division amongst ourselves.”
With Sullivan remaining behind in Alaska, Trump repeated his Wasilla message at rallies in Arizona and Montana the following day.
The President has been campaigning nationwide in an effort to boost Republican candidates in the November general election.
“That’s going to end very soon,” Trump said on Wednesday morning in Bullhead City, Arizona, of the Iran war. “And when that ends, your gasoline is going to go down to even lower than it was before it started.”
“If they had a nuclear weapon, within 24 hours they would use it. They’ll knock out the Middle East. Then they’ll start hitting us on the West Coast. They’ll hit Europe because they’re crazy. They’re crazy people. So, this is a very small price people pay. And I thought it would go up much higher,” Trump said of fuel prices.
Later that day, in Kalispell, Montana, Trump gave similar remarks.
“We had the greatest economy in the history of our country in my first administration. We are going to blow it away in this administration, as soon as — as soon as Iran — Iran is going to be over very quickly,” he said.
Oil shipments through the Strait of Hormuz, south of Iran, have risen in recent months but have not yet returned to pre-war levels.
On the same day as Trump’s remarks in Arizona and Montana, two commercial ships sank in the Strait of Hormuz south of Iran, and CNN reported that the United States is considering whether to attack Iran with the largest non-nuclear bomb in its arsenal.
Yereth Rosen contributed reporting from Anchorage.
