Hagerty: ‘More Inflation In the Pipeline’ as States Spend Unspent COVID Relief Money

On Tuesday’s broadcast of the Fox Business Network’s “Mornings with Maria,” Sen. Bill Hagerty (R-TN) stated that as states spend unappropriated COVID relief funds, there will be “more inflation in the pipeline yet to come.”

Host Maria Bartiromo asked, “I spoke with the Ranking Member in the House on the Budget Committee, Jason Smith (R-MO), who told me that out of that COVID relief package that the president signed into law back in March of ’21, several states received hundreds of billions of dollars in money, and he says that that money hasn’t even been appropriated yet. So, we look at the inflation timeline of how inflation has been stoked by all of this spending over the last year, obviously, we’re at 8.6% right now on the Consumer Price Index. Do you think inflation gets worse because that money has not been appropriated yet in many of those states?”

Hagerty responded, “Well, absolutely, to extent that those states are going to release that money into the economy. Again, more dollars chasing fewer goods. On the regulatory side, the Biden administration is choking off supply, and then adding more and more stimulus. These states are not going to be inclined to give this money back. The Democrats in Congress are not going to allow that to happen. We’ve already seen that. So, this, again, is going to have more inflation in the pipeline yet to come.”

Follow Ian Hanchett on Twitter @IanHanchett