As President Trump traveled to Ireland on diplomatic business in mid-September 2026, the national average gas price surged sixteen cents in a single week to $4.31 per gallon — a reminder that the economic pressures a leader faces at home do not pause for foreign travel. The spike, arriving atop months of already elevated fuel costs, struck American households with particular force, translating abstract market volatility into the concrete arithmetic of the gas pump. Throughout history, energy costs have served as a kind of barometer of public trust in governance, and this moment was no differen