Khanna: Spending During COVID Is a Factor in Record Inflation, But We ‘Needed’ Spending ‘in Part to Get out of the Recession’

On Thursday’s broadcast of the Fox News Channel’s “America Reports,” Rep. Ro Khanna (D-CA) stated that massive spending during the coronavirus pandemic under Presidents Donald Trump and Joe Biden is a cause of the highest inflation in forty years, but “we needed that in part to get out of the recession.”

Co-host Sandra Smith asked, [relevant exchange begins around 5:20] “Congressman, what caused the four-decade high inflation? Was it spending or not?”

Khanna responded, “I think it’s multiple factors. One, we weren’t producing enough in America. And two, we had COVID, and on a bipartisan basis, both under Trump and Biden, we spent a lot, but we needed that in part to get out of the recession. We should be proud that the American economy did better than any other economy in the world and we didn’t have the unemployment that you see in Europe. But now we need to work to lower prices, particularly food prices. And one of the things I think we should do is go after monopoly producers. But look, Powell has a very hard job, because on the one hand, there’s recession. On the other hand, inflation has been too high. I don’t envy his role.”

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