CNN’s Reporter Says Americans ‘Okay’ With Record Gas Prices if it Means ‘Holding Russia Accountable’

CNN’s Vanessa Yurkevich said she has spoken to Americans who are happy to pay more for gas to hold Russia “accountable” for invading Ukraine.

The country woke up to record gas prices early Tuesday morning. Nationwide, the price at the pump eclipsed what people paid during the summer of 2008.

The average price for regular is currently $4.17 a gallon. That price was effective before President Joe Biden banned all imports of Russian oil.

Yurkevich joined At This Hour from a New Jersey gas station on Tuesday morning.

She stated the country saw “a 55 cent jump in prices in just the last week.” She softened the blow when she told the network’s viewers: “If we’re looking at it, adjusted for inflation, prices were actually higher in 2008 than they are today.”

She further noted that the U.S. only purchases around 8% of its energy from Russia, before she continued:

Not a huge amount compared to somewhere like the European union, which buys a lot more. So, if you look at it globally, if the European union decides to do something similar as to what president Biden is going to be doing in his announcement, stopping all Russian imports of energy into the country, that could have a significant ripple effect on the global energy market, than pushing prices here at home at the pump a lot higher.

Yurkevich then told host Kate Bolduan she spoke to numerous people who are content with paying more for gas.

She said, “Kate, but as you mentioned, people we’ve spoken to over the last couple of weeks, they’re okay paying higher prices if it means holding Russia accountable for what they are doing in Ukraine.”

Bolduan noted, The big question, the big unknown, do any of these moves change Putin’s behavior, change the way he is acting right now.”

Watch above, via CNN.