U.S. Energy Secy.: Gas prices fall below $3 for first time in over 4 years

Drivers in the U.S. are getting some relief, just in time for the holidays, as the national average for regular gas has dropped to $2.99 a gallon — the first time prices have dipped below $3 in over four years.

U.S. Energy Secretary Chris Wright stated that the drop is not a coincidence, emphasizing that “nothing’s better than saving money,” especially when family spending is at an all-time high during the holidays. 

 “Every week you fill up your gas tank, you got more money in your pocket to buy your kids presents and pay your bills,” Wright exclaimed. “This is what happens when the American public elects a president who cares about their pocketbook, cares about American people and not special interests or the climate crazies or whatever the interest the Democrats are trying to appease. President Trump’s just focused on the American consumer.”

“Imagine if Harris had won the election, where would gasoline prices be today? How would American consumers feel?” he questioned. “Those are political choices. They’re not unfortunate facts. They’re political choices to make energy expensive.”

AAA reported that prices have not been this low since May 2021 — a finding that GasBuddy similarly corroborated this week.

Oklahoma ($2.40), Texas ($2.52), Arkansas ($2.54), Colorado ($2.53), Mississippi ($2.57), Tennessee ($2.57), Louisiana ($2.60), Iowa ($2.60), Wisconsin ($2.62), Alabama ($2.67), and Kentucky ($2.68) have the lowest average gas prices.

On the other hand, higher gas pricing averages are notable in states like California ($4.51), Hawaii ($4.44), Washington ($4.14), Oregon ($3.75), Nevada ($3.68), Alaska ($3.68), Arizona ($3.27), Pennsylvania ($3.20), and Idaho ($3.19).

President Donald Trump also said during a press conference this week that he believes the national average will continue to decrease.

“We’re gonna be, I think, at $2 a gallon,” Trump said during a press conference earlier this week. “We could even crack that at some point, I’d love to do it. We could do it more easily if we weren’t building up the Strategic National Reserves, which Biden emptied out before the election.”

Trump referred to the Strategic Petroleum Reserve — the U.S. government’s emergency stockpile of crude oil stored along the Gulf Coast. With crude oil prices hovering around $60 a barrel, this has helped drive down gasoline costs for consumers. Secretary Wright has since outlined another approach to saving Americans money: accelerating development of our domestic oil and gas supplies.

“We will see increasing production in the next six to 12 months out of the Gulf of America. If you look carefully at the oil production data in the U.S., as a whole right now, it’s almost a million barrels a day higher than it was 12 months ago. So even with low oil prices, we’re seeing more development. Just common sense is back in town.”

The U.S. Energy Information Administration foresees gas prices remaining below $3 a gallon on average in 2026.