The Daily - The View of the War From a Florida Gas Station

Episode Date: March 27, 2026

For the past four weeks, soaring gas prices across the United States have become a symbol of the domestic impact of the war in Iran. Cameron Joudi, who owns and manages a gas station in Jacksonville, Fla., discusses how the war is reaching him at home.  Guest: Cameron Joudi, the owner of a gas station. Background reading:  A state-by-state look at the increases in gas prices and how they could affect you. Gas prices rose more than 30 percent in some states. Photo: Cameron Joudi manages an independent gas station in suburban Jacksonville, Fla. Dustin Miller for The New York Times For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily. Transcripts of each episode will be made available by the next workday.  Subscribe today at nytimes.com/podcasts or on Apple Podcasts and Spotify. You can also subscribe via your favorite podcast app here https://www.nytimes.com/activate-access/audio?source=podcatcher. For more podcasts and narrated articles, download The New York Times app at nytimes.com/app. Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Can I give them a four, please? Yeah. That's it, brother. There you go, brother. Can you just explain what it is you're about to do? I'm going to raise the gas price. From the New York Times, I'm Michael Babaro. This is the Daily.

So we've got to go into the fuel manager menu and fuel price configuration. I'm going to go from 449 on my premium to 469. For the past four weeks, gas stations across the United States have become a kind of microcosm of the war's domestic impact. It's there at thousands of pumps and cash registers that a test of wills is playing out in real time. I just got to download the fuel prices to my pumps, and that's that. Price increased. Between gas station managers, deciding, day after day, just how much to charge for a gallon of gas, and already cash-strapped consumers

deciding just how much pain they're willing to endure. I mean, does any part of you just feel like really bad that you have to do that? Yeah, yeah. I feel bad. I mean, it's a necessity. I have to, but yeah, I feel bad. That kind of hurts. Today, the view of this way. from a neighborhood gas station in Jacksonville, Florida. It's Friday, March 27th. Okay, I think this is it. Yeah, here we go. Yo, we're getting there.

Hey, Florida. Florida drivers. Last week, Daily producer Anna Foley and I headed to suburban Jacksonville to talk to a gas station manager named Cam Judy. Hey, guys. What's going on? Welcome here.

Hi. Michael. Camaro. Cameron, nice to meet you. Nice to meet you. Now, why this station and this manager? Oh, we can come on back? Okay, great.

Because Cam runs a quickly vanishing business in this country and independently owned gas station. You got some serious little Debbie. Serious little Debbie stuff, of course. Yeah, right there, right in front, staring at me across the way. All day, whispering my name. Honeybuns. Meaning that Cam and Cam alone sets the price. I've never been in the guts of the cashier's...

The cashier's wing of the store. We met him on a Tuesday, when regular unleaded gas at his station cost $3.79 a gallon, about 40% higher than before the war started. Kim was manning the cast register of the station's convenience store, and it's inside this store on a residential street across from an elementary school where you really see how intimately he's woven himself into this community. What's up, Rick? Mr. Lee.

Hey, Lewis. Yeah, you're good, brother. Are you on a first-name basis to allow your customers? Yeah, yeah. After eight years, almost nine years this July, it'll be nine years. I got a lot of regulars that come in here. Cam took over the business about a decade ago from his father, who started buying convenience stores after he immigrated to the U.S. from Syria by way of Guatemala. This gas station in particular he bought right around the time my sister was born, I believe.

Seems to be a trend. He has a kid. He has a gas station. He has a kid. I don't know. And Cam grew up watching his father really become the unofficial mayor of this neighborhood. He always goes back to the show. everybody loves Raymond. That's his name, Raymond. So even growing up as a kid, we couldn't go out to eat without running into somebody that he knew from one of the stores.

A waiter, somebody in the back cooking our food in the kitchen, somebody waiting in line for their coffee. He knows everybody. And it went beyond just knowing everybody. His father's customers were treated as an extension of the Judy family. I didn't know the extent of my dad's impact on some of these customers. Until I started working here, when someone would come in here and tell me, like, you know, your dad, like, I was, I was, my power was off. And he loaned me the money I needed to get the electricity back on, you know? And stuff like that is like, dad, did you really do that?

He's like, of course I did. They've been coming to my store for 10, 15 years. So for Cam, this was really the only way he knew to run a business. These regular customers that I get in here, I mean, I've known them now for eight years. that's a longer time than I've known my kids. I only got a four-year-old. So some of these people, they've been around for my wife's pregnancies. I had several regular customers when they found out my wife was pregnant.

They brought me boxes and boxes and boxes of diapers. Like, it's just really cool. I don't think a lot of people get to experience that, where a customer comes to your business almost every single day, sometimes up to six times a day, become a huge part of your life. They really do. And just to give you an example,

when Cam catches local students shoplifting, which happens with some frequency, he never calls the police. He tells somebody else. I know their PE coach. He comes in here every day. So I tell him, I show him a picture of the kid on my camera, and he makes them run laps.

Get out of here. That's local justice. I love it. So when the war broke out a few weeks ago, right before the war, I remember we were sitting at 279 for a long time. And Cam realized he was going to have to raise gas prices. From 279 to 299 to 309.

Over and over. We went up almost 20 cents in 48 hours. And over again. Gosh, it's been almost every day. He wasn't repeatedly raising gas prices on strangers. He was raising prices on people he really cares about. People who he knows are already stretched very thin. I hope they understand that I'm not pricing my gas to make a quick buck.

I'm pricing my gas how I need to price it in order to stay afloat. And just to explain how this works, this is actually not making Cam more money. My distributor of fuel is charging me per gallon. And then I have to account for if they're going to charge me to get it to the gas station. Trucking fees. Trucking fees to the store itself. And then we also have to account for the different fees that are associated with the customer purchasing gas,

the credit card companies and debit card companies. For Cam, the margins on gas are actually pretty slim. I mean, there's really such a small amount of profit to be made per gallon for a business like mine. I mean, I'm talking maybe 10 to 15 cents per gallon max for my store. His pumps hold about 8,000 gallons, which usually lasts a couple of weeks. And so 10 cents of profit on that, is about $800, which is a surprisingly small amount of profit for a gas station to make on gas. How did you think about this question of how much you could increase the price of the pump, knowing your customer?

How did you balance all that? I mean, my regular customers, they're pretty loyal. I like to think that they would choose my store over a big corporate-owned gas station or a big chain gas station. a franchise like that just because it's my store. Can I consider the customer when I'm making these gas prices? Not really because, you know, as much as I love my regular customers, I can't take a loss per gallon. I can't, it would be even, it would be difficult to even figure out what my

break-even number would be, you know? We've got to at least make a couple cents off of each gallon. Or there's really no point in selling guys. Selling gas. I could take the gas price of that big chain gas station up the road that's priced at $3.99 today. I could say, well, I'm independently owned. I need to have a bigger profit margin and price mine for $409. I could do that. There's no problem with me doing that. I know gas station owners that do that. They go 10 cents over their nearest big corporate gas station just so that they can make a little bit more of a profit margin. I choose not to, specifically because of the relationship. I have with my regular customers. I would love for this to be over next week, and I go back to $279 a gallon. That'd be awesome. I hope, beyond hope, that it is temporary, and it does not last long.

But yeah, I do worry about the longevity of these high prices. It would be a strain on a lot of people, myself included. But despite his best intentions, as we wrapped up our conversation and Cam's Day came to an end, he checks in on prices around town. Most of his rivals were at $3.99 a gallon for regular. He had been holding steady at $3.79. He looks out at the pumps. I don't like to do it when customers are pumping gas.

And he makes the call to raise the prices. So I'm going to raise it from $3.79 to $3.99. That's a big jump. It is a big jump. Yeah. So if I go outside right now, even on that big sign? The big sign is happening right now, too. And it's almost instant.

Yep. Boom. We'll be right back. Good morning, Cam. Morning. It's cold. It's cold for Florida. Yes, it is.

That's right. The next morning, just before 7 a.m., Anna and I returned to the gas station to watch Cam open it up for the day. He's got to turn the lights on, turn the gas pumps on, and we're open for business. Those were the pumps? The pumps, yep. We wanted to understand just how much this relentless increase in gas prices,

including Cam's most recent hike, were hurting his customers. So this is 399 day. Do you think that people are going to notice the 20 cent increase today? Definitely. Oh, yeah. 3.79 to 399. It's a big jump. And, yeah, we'll definitely get some people in here that are,

and we were just, we were 20 cent cheaper yesterday. What happened, Cam? Over at the pumps, If you want to talk about gas prices. You don't want to start cussing now, huh? People did not hold back. It's out of hand. Out of hand.

Oh, my God. It's awful. It's just going to affect so many people. I mean, it's really so sad because people are already struggling, and this was just so unnecessary. It's like you're paying double now then what you was paying a couple weeks ago. People that's on picks and cons. They have a tough time with these gas prices.

The $100.98.80. That's a very expensive amount of gas. It's never been this bad, man. Most people didn't stick around for a very long conversation. They got back in their car. They told us they had to go to work. But among those who really talked to us, what became clear was just how minutely

they could describe gas prices' impact on their finances and how these far higher prices have become a kind of referendum. A referendum on the war in Iran, on President Trump himself, and really on the entire promise of America. Talking to people about gas prices. If you have thoughts, oh. I've seen them two something now they're at poor, so... We met a guy named Andrew, who, like many people in Jacksonville, is a veteran.

The region is a major military hub. I mean, I just got out of the military about a year ago, so now I'm on, like, a fixed income type stuff. So, like, seeing the gas prices go up really kind of hinders that a little bit. Were you in Iraq or Afghanistan? Jordan, Afghanistan area. Okay. And, yeah, once I saw that, they cut off the straight.

I was like, there go the gas prices. When you fill your car, what is the actual cost now? 50 bucks? It's usually, like, 30. So where has that come from? that pie chart of your life? Usually it comes from our grocery budget. Because everything else is like bills, you can't skip bills.

I mean, sometimes if we need to, we'll skip a bill. But we'll just go right back to it. But usually the allotment comes from our grocery bills. And does it change how you eat? Yeah. Can you give me an example? Like we've been going to those food banks every now and then, which help out. I like those.

A lot of local churches do help out, so that's pretty nice. I have three kids, so I make sure that they eat first. So usually we'll get all their food first, and then my wife and I will be like, okay, we have this much left, let's get us some dinners. So, like, there's been nights where her and I don't eat and we'll just let them eat. But we're cool with that, because, like,

as long as our kids eat, we're fine. That's a really meaningful sacrifice. I mean, they come first, so, I mean, we're fine. We can handle it, but I think I give it a month before all this levels off, maybe. You hope? I hope. Yeah.

One can hope. we just need to pull out and just not be there and just let the straight open up like it's not our war it's not our war it's not our war well thank you for spending time with us

and thank you for your service I appreciate it Andrew is literally skipping meals because of this war but we also met somebody whose financial pain is just as a median but who sees the war

and Trump's rationale for it in a totally different light. To talk about gas prices, he let us spend the day with him. What's your name? William. And what are you for work? Oh, new trucking company. Whoa, so you, this is important.

So you're involved in the trucking business at a time when gas is $4 a gallon. Well, when diesel's $5, in some states we're paying $6 and $7. So a lot of money's coming out of your pocket? Well, you're puffed 250 gallons every time you fill up. Yeah. man, it's costing anywhere between $1,200 to $1,600 for a tank of fuel now. Wow. And then the rates have not gone up.

So you'd be a strong candidate for being very upset about this war? I would be, yeah. But I think that it's worth it. I'm a Trumpster, but let me tell you, I have some issues with him at the moment, but I still support what we're doing in Iran because I've been watching it all my life. I'm 70 years old. So I support it before the people of Iran. If I were going to endorse the war, it would be simply to free the Iranian people from this ridiculous regime.

What happens after that? Who knows? Did they have a nuclear weapon? Why wouldn't they? So I don't know what drove his decision to do this, but I feel like it was very serious, you know? So you have faith that if the president has determined that the United States should be involved in a war against Iran, that he knows something and he's made this decision wisely. I truly believe that, yes.

He is not one to just go out and I don't think to just start this up for, you know, to hide the Epstein files or whatever. So that's all I know. That's all I can tell you. So if the war is justified, is the gas price increase a small price to pay?

Or does it feel like a big price to pay anyway? I don't think it's a big price to pay. I do worry about the commercial end of it. if there's no assistance or if there's no way to, I mean, a lot of these smaller trucking companies, people don't understand how many have gone out of business from the rate wars, okay? Now the ones that survived that...

Have to pay the gas prices. Right. It'll kick them right over the edge. So I am concerned about that. Hopefully it won't last that long. I think the war over there is going to last longer than four weeks, you know, but... But you can afford these gas prices. Yeah, I can afford it, yeah. I don't like it, but I don't.

can afford it. Thank you for a ton. Yes, sir. Thank you. Good luck, me, guys. So despite these higher prices, William is standing by the president for now. But there's a whole group of people for whom the promise of lower prices, including lower gas prices, was their primary reason for voting for Trump.

So now every trip to the gas pump feels like a betrayal. We're talking about gas prices. Huh. Unbelievable. Especially when we thought we were about to get those lower gas prices. I was happy for a couple weeks when I was $2 like, ha! Now it's hard. Including a woman who goes by Sean and is a licensed Medicare agent. I make $26 a hour.

Now, you tell me why should it be hard for me to put gas in the car. So you just put $6 in? $6. Why so little? Because. I mean, it was expensive. That was an expensive. It was.

hard right now. That's what I'm trying to tell you, like, on top of grocery, on top of rent, because I mean, I pay $2,000 to live every month. Now we're talking about gas. I have to ride to work, okay? I have grandchildren. I have two elderly parents that live in my home, one of them who has stage five kidney disease, okay? And I just took him to dialysis, so even with incomes, It's going like this. You're down the drain. Down the drain. You said you were excited for $2 gas.

Oh, my God. I was like, we are here. And was that something you heard from the president in his campaigns? Was that where you heard that from? Trump said that we were going to have lower gas. That was one of the things that he promised. And unfortunately, I voted for him. As a black woman, I voted for this man thinking that our economy is going to be amazing under him.

Yeah. And? And now I wish I never did that. Are you mad that he started this war and raised? Yeah. Because to me now, it's not even about people no more. It's about money. I know we are in America and we think we're safe,

but we're casualties of war. We have to start speaking out against what's going on and over there because we will be them if we don't stand up for them. You're upset? I'm upset. I'm upset. Do you feel like you were kind of hoodwinked? Yes, I was hoodwinked. This man talked about.

We were going to be great again. And I did kind of see that in my eyes. Like, we were not the America that we used to be. So, okay, we have this man coming through, and he's bold and he's powerful. He pumped me up off of, I'm a good man. But then he really was a wolf and sheep's clothing. I got everything I want. I got your vote.

And now I'm just going to tear it down. It's all about me and my money and my big rich friends. So I'm upset. I made the wrong vote. And I need everybody to understand what we're going through. Like, stop, we are not on the beach anymore. Take your shades off. The tsunami hit, and it was called President Trump.

We got to get up. I'm a proud American. Very, very proud American. And right today, I'm a sad American. I'm not real proud. I'm not real proud of us. Thank you for sharing. Take care.

So I think we're wrapping up KMR reporting at the gas station. And I wonder if you can forecast a little bit in the next week and whether you think you're going to have to keep raising prices. What it would take for you to lower them? I don't see lowering happening anytime soon. Usually when it's quick to write up, rise like this, it's slower to lower. I don't think it's going to take a week for me to have to raise it, honestly, above $3.99. As I was driving into work today, I passed by a gas station

charging $405 for credit card purchases on gasoline. So regular. Regular. And it was an independent as well, same as mine. Probably over the weekend, I'll probably have to go above $4. And as far as going well beyond $4, I could see it capping around $4.4.00. I could see it capping around 4-59. That's my estimated price cap, I believe. How do you come up with that number? That's probably the highest that I remember ever putting my gas prices at. I hope it doesn't get to 459. I hope it doesn't go above 409. But as unpredictable as everything is and what's going on, you just never know. Well, thank you again. Thank you guys. For all the time you've got us.

I appreciate y'all coming out here and talking to me about this. Until next time. Yes, sir. We'll be right back. Here's what else you need to know a day. They now have the chance that is Iran to permanently abandon their nuclear ambitions and to join a new path forward. We'll see if they want to do it.

On Thursday, President Trump sought to ratchet up pressure on Iran to enter into diplomatic negotiations to end the war. If they don't wear their worst nightmare, in the meantime, we'll just keep blowing. blowing them away, unimpeded, unstopped. Trump's latest threat came as Israel claimed it had killed a key Iranian naval commander who had led Iran's effort to close the Strait of Hormuz, and as Israel expanded its ground operations in Lebanon.

Meanwhile, the crisis at America's airports could soon come to an end after the Senate voted early Friday morning to reopen the Department of Homeland Security, which has been shut down for weeks. The bill, which now heads to the House, would fund every major DHS operation, including airport security, except for immigration enforcement. Today's episode was produced by Anna Foley and Caitlin O'Keefe.

It was edited by Devin Taylor. Contains music by Dan Powell, Diane Wong, Alicia Etoop, Marion Lazzano, and Chelsea Daniel. Our theme music is by Wonderly. This episode was engineered by Alyssa Moxley. That's it for the daily. I'm Michael Bobaro.

See you on Sunday.