California’s notoriously high gas prices are cheaper than usual, but you wouldn’t know it by watching politicians criticize each other about pain at the pump.

Democratic Gov. Gavin Newsom has sparred this summer with California Republicans and President Donald Trump over the issue. It’s a familiar fight in a state that regularly clocks the highest prices in the country. In an unusual twist, however, the spat has played out while California experienced a dip in prices along with the rest of the country.

A gallon of regular gas in the Golden State averaged $4.48 on Wednesday, compared to $4.65 a year prior, according to AAA’s fuel price tracker. California ranked just below Hawaii for the most expensive gas in the country.

But California gas remains way above the national average of $3.14 on Wednesday. In the U.S. South, prices dipped as low as $2.70.

Trump has seized on the lower national prices and used the opportunity to take more shots at Democrat-controlled California. The Republican has also taken credit for the lower gas prices after calling for OPEC, the international oil cartel dominated by U.S. ally Saudi Arabia, to boost oil production. The cartel appeared to abide and that sent prices falling.

That international increase in the supply of oil is responsible for the price dip, said Patrick De Haan, a gas price analyst at Gas Buddy. Even so, De Haan said Trump shouldn’t take credit.

“A U.S. president has probably even less power to direct or control the price of oil,” De Haan said. “State governors may have a little more power than even the president does.”

Trump has touted the favorable oil market and falsely claimed that gas prices sunk under $2 per gallon in some states, according to media reports. He also said that prices in California had spiked as high as $7 per gallon. That drew a rebuttal from Newsom’s office.

“Fact: Trump lied — again,” Newsom said in a news release. The governor proceeded to tout the price dip in California. The White House did not respond to a comment request.

It’s a sensitive issue for Newsom. In the fall, the governor called a special session of the Legislature to focus on gas prices and pushed through a law requiring oil refiners to keep a minimum fuel inventory to avoid supply shortages that spell higher gasoline prices for drivers — and profits for the industry.

Newsom has blamed the state’s high prices on oil industry price gouging and market manipulation. In 2023, he pushed for the creation of a first-of-its-kind state agency to monitor producers. The state hasn’t found market manipulation boosting gas prices, but the governor and others say that the new agency and price-gouging laws have helped ease price spikes.

And as oil companies plan to close refineries in the state, threatening serious supply shortages, Newsom’s administration softened its criticism and started seeking buyers to keep them in California.

“You have all sorts of fingers pointing blame and taking credit at the same time,” De Haan said.

The modest reprieve at the pump in California arrived at a critical time for Newsom. Starting in July, tightened environmental regulations went into effect that some analysts estimated would raise gas prices — but just how much has been intensely debated.

That regulatory change, plus the expected closures of a refinery in the Bay Area and another in Southern California, put Newsom under attack by California Republicans. Last month, the California Republican delegation in Congress condemned Newsom in an open letter; the governor responded with a marked-up version of the same letter, in red pen, with a slew of “corrections.”

So far, the stiffer regulations have tacked 7 cents to the cost of gas in California on average, according to California Energy Commission data obtained by Bay Area News Group. That figure is an average of a 12-month period ending in May 2025, the most recent data available. But analysts say the true cost is likely yet to be felt.

The regulations in question are contained in a key climate and air pollution program called the low carbon fuel standard. The California Air Resources Board, dominated by Newsom’s appointees, runs the program, which sets a limit on the carbon intensity of transportation fuels. That limit declines over years and decades. Companies whose fuels create too much carbon pollution — such as petroleum gas and diesel refineries — are required to buy credits from companies that make biogas, renewable diesel, electric vehicles and clean energy infrastructure.

Former Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger created the program. It’s evolved into a core component of California Democrats’ plans to decarbonize the transportation sector, which is responsible for 40% of the state’s greenhouse gas emissions.

In November, the air resources board took the controversial step of strengthening the limits on carbon intensity, in order to attract more investment in cleaner fuels and electric vehicles. The stricter rules went into effect in July. However, that change impacted the gas market six months early, in January, when the petroleum fuels industry raised prices based on the impending regulations, Politico reported.

So far, the stiffer regulation has had little impact on gas prices. In total, the program added 14 cents of cost at the pump in May 2025, the most recent data available. In May 2024, before the board made it stricter, it added 8 cents.

That hasn’t stopped a top Republican critic of the program from sounding the alarm.

“Californians need to be ready,” state Senate Republican Leader Brian Jones of San Diego said in a statement on Wednesday. “Start saving now and brace for sticker shock at the pump. With these new state-imposed costs, fuel prices are expected to spike unpredictably in the foreseeable future.”

Analysts told Bay Area News Group that the program could still raise prices substantially, although it hasn’t yet, based on the market dynamics for credits that are traded through the low carbon fuel standard. Those credits fluctuate.

Megan Boutwell, president of Irvine-based consulting firm Stillwater Associates, said while the low carbon fuel standard isn’t adding much sticker shock at the pump, “that doesn’t mean that it won’t.” She estimated that drivers will see a 25-cent increase within a few years.

Danny Cullenward, a climate economist at the University of Pennsylvania who penned a report in 2024 that estimated a maximum 65-cent cost for the low carbon fuel standard in the near term that was cited by Jones and other Republicans, said it remains accurate.

“I don’t think that relatively low fuel price impacts seen in recent months are here to stay,” Cullenward said.

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