President Donald Trump has mounted a new push to tackle affordability, taking aim at beef and gasoline amid surging consumer prices that may threaten his party’s hold on Congress.

Trump was poised to sign executive orders Monday intended to reduce beef prices, a White House official said, while he also voiced support for a gasoline-tax holiday to counter rising pump prices.

The president’s moves come ahead of a key inflation report on Tuesday that economists expect to show a sharply higher consumer price index after the Iran war triggered price surges that are rippling through manufacturing and farming, and to the ballot box in November.

Trump told reporters at the White House on Monday that he’ll seek to suspend the federal 18.4 cents-a-gallon tax on gasoline “until it’s appropriate,” though it’s unclear how much of the cut would flow through to consumers.

The planned orders on beef aim to address short-term supply issues in the U.S. by expanding imports and by supporting a rebuild of the country’s domestic cattle herd, according to the official, who requested anonymity to discuss the measures before they are made public.

The U.S. cattle herd has shrunk to a 75-year low, sending consumer prices to record highs while also tightening margins for meat processors. The cost of beef has been a key driver of food inflation, making it a political flashpoint for the Trump administration ahead of November’s congressional elections. The president has blamed meatpackers, particularly foreign-owned firms, for the increase, and the Justice Department is investigating the industry for potential antitrust behavior, even as processors have been losing money.

Pausing the gas tax would require an act of Congress, which is far from guaranteed. Rapidan Energy Group, a Washington consulting firm, recently put the odds of success of such a measure passing at 25%.

Sen. Josh Hawley later said he would introduce legislation to suspend the gasoline tax. The Missouri Republican’s proposal also would temporarily halt the 24.4-cent tax on diesel, a move that could prove popular with farmers in his home state and elsewhere.

As for beef, Trump’s measures would suspend the annual tariff-rate quota, which applies a higher rate after a certain level of beef imports are reached, on all beef-exporting nations, the Wall Street Journal reported, citing people familiar with the matter. It would enable more meat to enter the U.S. at low rates.

The gas tax effort shows the White House is scrambling for answers with Republicans already on the defensive over rising electricity bills in recent months. Yet gasoline prices, one of the most visible signs of inflation, are especially potent politically. Voters typically blame the White House when they rise.

U.S. gasoline prices have soared more than 50% to a national average of $4.52 a gallon since the war erupted. The conflict has disrupted shipping through the Strait of Hormuz — through which about a fifth of the world’s oil and liquefied natural gas flowed before the war.

A pause on the gas tax would likely lower prices between 10 and 16 cents a gallon, according to research from the Bipartisan Policy Center in April, citing estimates from the impacts of state-level gas tax suspensions in 2022.

“It’s a small percentage but it’s still money,” Trump said.

(With assistance from Jennifer A. Dlouhy, Ilena Peng, Caitlin Reilly, Will Kubzansky, Kate Sullivan and Megan Scully.)

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