Twitter users on Sunday flagged a tweet from the official presidential handle @POTUS that had President Biden touting "the most common gas price" in the country at $3.19, drawing attention to the fact that was lower than what the average consumer sees at the pump.
“Right now, the most common price at gas stations across the country is $3.19 per gallon. That's progress,” Biden wrote.
The Tweet was flagged with the platform’s context feature, which allows readers to add “context they thought people might want to know.” The marker appears when the addition is rated helpful by other users.
“Biden is referring to the ‘most common gas price’ as oppose to the average gas price of $3.800 (11/6/22). The most common is the ‘mode’ gas price. Neither are wrong and politicians tend to reference the one that is lower. The mode diminishes high gas states from the equation,” the addition read, linking to a gas prices tracker from AAA and an article from The Wall Street Journal about why the most common price of gas is different from the average.
The context wasn’t a correction on Biden’s post, as the president made clear he was referring to “the most common price” for gas, but the flag drew attention to the notable discrepancy between the most common price and the average price.
It's at least the second time the Biden White House has been flagged on Twitter since Elon Musk took over more than one week ago.
Last week, the White House deleted a tweet that credited Biden for an increase in Social Security checks for seniors after numerous observers pointed out the raise was a result of high inflation, which has been one his administration's biggest struggles this year.
Twitter later added context below the tweet noting that the increase was due to the annual cost of living adjustment as part of a 1972 law that tied automatic benefit adjustments to the consumer price index, a key marker of inflation.
With the economy a top election issue heading into Tuesday's midterms — among recession fears and high prices from inflation — the White House is angling to paint the administration's impact on the economy in a good light.
But that proved to be problematic again last month when Biden in a speech said that "today, the most common price of gas in America is $3.39 — down from over $5 when I took office," but fact-checkers were quick to clarify that the most common price for a gallon of gas was actually much cheaper when he took office, at $2.39, according to CNN.
