President Biden on Wednesday said his administration has made “striking progress” to alleviate the supply chain crisis and keep store shelves stocked for holiday shoppers.
“The much-predicted crisis didn’t occur,” Mr. Biden said. “Packages are moving, goods are being delivered, shelves are not empty.”
Mr. Biden made the remarks from the White House ahead of a meeting on supply chain disruptions that included members of his Cabinet and private-sector CEOs.
Supply chain problems have wreaked havoc on the holiday shopping season with shortages of consumer goods and higher prices.
Mr. Biden said the steps he has taken over the past month have helped reduce pricing pressures and that addressing cost increases will be his administration’s top priority.
The president said retail inventories are up 3% from last year and on-shelf availability for consumer goods is roughly 90%, which remains unchanged from before the COVID-19 pandemic. Meanwhile, he said, shipping companies such as FedEx, UPS and the U.S. Postal Service have improved delivery times.
“This is striking progress since November,” Mr. Biden said.
Mr. Biden said his aggressive action to fix the supply chain has led to the most robust growth of any first-year president in nearly 50 years.
Yet the economy will likely be a headache for Mr. Biden and congressional Democrats ahead of the midterm elections next year. Inflation and a shortage of goods remain the top issues among voters, and two polls released this week give Mr. Biden poor marks for his handling of inflation and the economy overall.
Republicans have not eased their criticism of Mr. Biden‘s efforts to fix the supply chain. Instead, they have portrayed him as a Scrooge who is keeping Americans from receiving Christmas gifts.
“Humbug. President Biden‘s supply-chain crisis is threatening a lot of families’ Christmas Plans,” House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy, California Republican, said in a tweet.
Mr. McCarthy also posted a study concluding that 16% of all packages shipped via UPS and FedEx will not arrive in time for Christmas.
In a tweet, the Republican National Committee slammed Mr. Biden for saying the supply chain crisis didn’t actually occur, declaring his statement “completely false.”
Bottlenecks at ports persist as cargo ships await berthing space. At the Port of Los Angeles, a line of container ships stretches to Mexico. Some analysts have said the chaos could last until mid-2022 or early 2023.
Mr. Biden said Wednesday that the number of containers moving through ports at Los Angeles and Long Beach is higher than ever, and he credited his administration for striking a deal with longshoremen. Those two ports handle 40% of the container traffic in the United States.
The administration this week announced $230 million in port infrastructure grants, according to a White House fact sheet issued ahead of Mr. Biden‘s remarks.
Wednesday’s meeting was Mr. Biden‘s second with CEOs in the past two months. In November, the president held a meeting with the CEOs of several major retailers and grocery chains to discuss the supply chain bottlenecks.
Afterward, Mr. Biden reassured Americans that store shelves would be stocked for the holiday season.
Among those who attended Wednesday’s meeting were Frederick W. Smith, CEO of FedEx; Darren Hawkins, CEO of Yellow Corp; Christopher Connor, CEO of the American Association of Port Authorities; Sonia Syngal, CEO of Gap; and Dave Harrison, executive director of Fastport.
Administration officials who participated included Commerce Secretary Gina Raimondo, Labor Secretary Marty Walsh, Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg, National Economic Council Director Brian Deese and port envoy John Porcari.
Correction: A previous version of this story misspelled the name of Labor Secretary Marty Walsh.
