This story was originally published by the WND News Center.

Consumers suffering under the inflation and high-interest rates of Joe Biden's economy got more bad news on Friday.

A key metric watched by the Fed, which has been raising those interest rates and has put mortgages above the 7% mark now, rose unexpectedly to 4.4%.

The Washington Examiner pointed out that inflation remains "much hotter than the central bank's target."

And, the report said, it's "damaging household purchasing power."

Inflation was at or below 2% while President Trump was in office, but Biden sparked chaos when he took office by attacking the domestic energy production industry, imposing "equity" costs on corporations, and much more.

He triggered an explosion in inflation – which reached 9.1% just a year ago. While that's been down somewhat since, it still remains a problem, which has the Fed raising interest rates over and over in its attempt to bring that inflation down.

Economists and analysts had predicted a 3.9% inflation for the month, the report said.

"Core PCE inflation, a measure of inflation that strips out energy and food prices and is generally less volatile, clocked in at a 4.7% year-over-year rate.," the report noted.

"We will be sticking with the forecast for the Fed to keep rates unchanged through the remainder of this year," Ryan Sweet, chief U.S. economist at Oxford Economics, said in the report. "However, odds are rising that we will be altering the forecast for the fed funds rate in 2024, reducing the number of rate cuts."

The inflation sparked by Biden's policies was the highest in decades. The Examiner noted earlier this month, the Bureau of Labor Statistics said inflation fell slightly to 4.9% in the year ending in April.

It explained the Fed’s target rate now is 5% to 5.25%, "the highest it has been since the financial crisis in 2008."

With the expectation of lower inflation, analysts had been predicting the Fed would leave interest rates along at its next meeting.

"The dynamic has now shifted. Investors are putting the odds of another rate hike at nearly 53%, showing just how much certain reports can change the trajectory of the Fed," the report said.