Three times now, Biden has suggested that inflation was 9 percent — “skyrocketing” — when he took office. But it was 1.4 percent in January 2021. According to the White House, Biden is arguing that the conditions for the 9 percent inflation reached in June 2022 were already in place when he became president 17 months earlier.

With proper framing, Biden could reasonably make that case, though economists may differ on whether Biden’s policies added fuel to the inflation fire. The Russia-Ukraine war certainly did.

But this is not what Biden said. While his other comments on inflation that we examined were imprecisely worded or slightly misleading, the fact that the president has gotten this wrong three times suggests this is more than slip of the tongue. He earns Four Pinocchios.