CNBC’s Sara Eisen Swipes At Trump Econ Adviser For ‘Brushing Off’ Americans’ Pain at the Pump

CNBC’s Sara Eisen, who’s guest hosting The View this week, swiped at Trump economic adviser Kevin Hassett for dismissing Americans’ pain at the pump due to the war with Iran.

Whoopi Goldberg played tape of Hassett calling the U.S. economy “fundamentally sound,” adding that if gas prices were to remain high, “it wouldn’t really disrupt the U.S. Economy very much at all.”

Hassett admitted, “It would hurt consumers and we’d have to think about, you know, if that continued, what we would have to do about that, but that’s like really the last of our concerns right now because we’re very confident that this thing is going ahead of schedule.”

“It was kind of unfortunate how he phrased it,” Eisen said. “He basically just brushed it off and said it’s the last thing we’re worried about.”

She continued:

Americans are feeling this, I don’t have to tell you guys. If you have filled up a tank of gas, you are paying 80 to 90 cents more per gallon than before this war began. That’s a sharp increase. It’s painful. You feel it and it will impact your spending everywhere else. It’s an economic hit.

The good news, there are many reasons to believe that it is short-lived and that it is temporary, and I’ll tell you why. Because why it’s happening — just overnight there’s more bombings and attacks on Iranian oil facilities, on other facilities like Qatar in the Gulf. What will happen is either the military campaign will stop, will end, or the U.S. and Israel will actually be successful in degrading a lot of Iran’s capabilities to do things like block this very important Strait of Hormuz, which is where…20% of oil exports go through, which is causing oil prices to spike.

“When one of two of those things happen, the Strait opens up, there’s reason to believe oil prices will come back down,” Eisen said, adding, “by the end of the year the market is telling you — hopefully they’re right — that oil prices will be a lot lower than they are right now.”

“That’s a lot of ifs!” exclaimed a skeptical Goldberg.

“It’s a lot of ifs,” Sunny Hostin repeated.

Watch the clip above via The View on ABC.

New: The Mediaite One-Sheet "Newsletter of Newsletters"
Your daily summary and analysis of what the many, many media newsletters are saying and reporting. Subscribe now!