WASHINGTON (AP) — More people are falling behind on paying their bills to keep on the lights and heat their homes, according to a new analysis of consumer data — a warning sign for the U.S. economy and another political headache for President Donald Trump.
Past due balances to utility companies jumped 9.7% annually to $789 between the April-June periods of 2024 and 2025, said The Century Foundation, a liberal think tank, and the advocacy group Protect Borrowers. The increase has overlapped with a 12% jump in monthly energy bills during the same period.
Consumers usually prioritize their utility bills along with their mortgages and auto debt, said Julie Margetta Morgan, the foundation's president. The increase in both energy costs and delinquencies may suggest that consumers are falling behind on other bills, too.
“There’s a lot of information out there about rising utility costs, but here we can actually look at what that impact has been on families in terms of how they’re falling behind," Margetta Morgan said.
Troubles paying electricity and natural gas bills reflect something of an economic quandary for Trump, who is promoting the buildout of the artificial intelligence industry as a key part of an economic boom he has promised for America. But AI data centers are known for their massive use of electricity, and threaten to further increase utility bills for everyday Americans.
These troubles also come as Trump faces political pressure from voters fed up with the high cost of living. The president spoke about the economy and affordability issues Monday at an event hosted by the McDonald’s fast food company.
“We have it almost at the sweet spot and prices are coming down on different things,” Trump said at the event, adding that inflation has been “normalized” at a “low level.”
Ever since Republicans saw their fortunes sag in off-year elections this month and affordability was identified as the top issue, Trump has been trying to convince the public that prices are falling. Fast-rising electricity bills could be an issue in some congressional battlegrounds in next year's midterm elections.
Trump has put a particular emphasis on prices at the pump. Gasoline accounts for about 3% of the consumer price index, slightly less than the share belonging to electricity and natural gas bills — meaning that possible savings on gasoline could be more than offset by higher utility bills.
The president maintains that any troubling data on inflation is false and that Democrats are simply trying to hurt his administration's reputation.
“In fact, costs under the TRUMP ADMINISTRATION are tumbling down, helped greatly by gasoline and ENERGY," Trump posted on social media Friday. "Affordability is a lie when used by the Dems.”
Nearly 6 million households have utility debt “so severe” that it will soon be reported to collection agencies, according to the foundation's analysis, drawn from the University of California Consumer Credit Panel.
During Trump's first six months in office, there was a 3.8% increase in households with severely overdue utility bills.
“Voters are frustrated and families are hurting because these tech giants are cutting backroom deals with politicians, and it’s causing their power bills to go up,” said Mike Pierce, executive director of Protect Borrowers. “If the Trump administration doesn’t want to do its job and protect families and make life more affordable, I guess that’s its choice."
Both Margetta Morgan and Pierce previously worked at the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, a government agency formed in part to track trends in household borrowing to prevent potential abuses. The Trump administration has essentially shut down the bureau.
The administration has so far said it has no responsibility for any increases in electricity prices, since those are often regulated by state utility boards. The White House maintains that utility costs are higher in Democratic states that rely on renewable forms of energy.
“Electricity prices are a state problem,” Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent told ABC News this month. “There are things that the federal government can control. Local electricity prices are not one of them.”
The new analysis of utility bills by the groups counters that the Trump administration is contributing to higher utility costs “by impeding renewable energy generation" including solar and wind power.
While that analysis is a warning sign, other economic analyses on consumers suggest their finances are stable despite some emerging pressures.
The New York Federal Reserve has said delinquency rates of 90 days or more for mortgages, auto loans and student debt have each increased over the past 12 months, though it said mortgage delinquencies are “relatively low.” An analysis of debit and credit card spending by the Bank of America Institute showed that consumers’ “overall financial health looks sound.”
President Donald Trump waves as he walks to board Marine One, Friday, Nov. 14, 2025, on the South Lawn of the White House, in Washington for a trip to Palm Beach, Fla. (AP Photo/Allison Robbert)
JERUSALEM (AP) — Israeli police forcibly entered the compound of the United Nations agency for Palestinian refugees in East Jerusalem early Monday, escalating a campaign against an organization that has been banned from operating on Israeli territory.
The U.N. Relief and Works Agency for Palestinian Refugees in the Near East, or UNRWA, said in a statement that “sizeable numbers” of Israeli forces, including police on motorcycles, trucks and forklifts, entered the compound in the Palestinian neighborhood of Sheikh Jarrah and cut communications to the compound.
“The unauthorized and forceful entry by Israeli security forces is an unacceptable violation of UNRWA’s privileges and immunities as a U.N. agency,” the statement read.
Photos taken by an Associated Press photographer show police erecting an Israeli flag on top of the compound, and police cars on the street. Photos provided by UNRWA staff show a group of Israeli police officers inside the compound.
Police said in a statement they entered for a “debt-collection procedure” initiated by Jerusalem's municipal government, which did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
The raid was the latest in Israel's campaign against the agency, which provides aid and services to some 2.5 million Palestinian refugees in Gaza, the occupied West Bank and east Jerusalem, as well as 3 million more refugees in Syria, Jordan and Lebanon.
The agency was established to help the estimated 700,000 Palestinians who fled or were driven out of what is now Israel during the 1948 war surrounding the creation of the Israeli state. UNRWA supporters say Israel hopes to erase the Palestinian refugee issue by dismantling the agency. Israel says the refugees should be permanently resettled outside its borders.
For more than a year since the Israel-Hamas war began on Oct. 7, 2023, UNRWA was the main lifeline for Gaza's population that largely relied on aid following the humanitarian crisis unleashed by heavy Israeli bombardment and blockades on the entry of goods.
Restrictions on goods have since eased after a US-brokered ceasefire was reached on Oct. 10.
Throughout the war, Israel has accused the agency of being infiltrated by Hamas, allegations the U.N. has denied. After months of mounting attacks from Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and his far-right allies, Israel formally banned it from operating on its territory in January.
The U.S., formerly the largest donor to UNRWA, halted funding to the agency in early 2024.
UNRWA has since struggled to continue its work in Gaza, with other U.N. agencies, including the World Food Program and UNICEF, stepping in to help compensate for a gap UNRWA says is unfillable.
“If you squeeze UNRWA out, what other agency can fill that void?” Tamara Alrifai, UNRWA’s director of external relations and communications, told the AP in Doha.
Alrifai said UNRWA has been excluded from the talks.
The agency shut down its Jerusalem compound in May after far-right protesters, including at least one member of Israeli Parliament, overran its gate in the presence of the police. Israel’s far-right has pushed to turn the compound into a settlement.
Netanyahu met with the U.S. Ambassador to the U.N., Mike Walz and other officials on Monday in a visit the Trump administration said was aimed at pushing forward the 20-point plan for Gaza, suggested in September by President Donald Trump, that includes the current ceasefire and its following stages.
In a statement, the U.S. mission to the U.N. said it would “discuss shared priorities for regional security and humanitarian aid."
With most of the hostage bodies returned to Israel by Palestinian militants, Arab and Western officials have said they expect an international governing body in the Gaza Strip to be announced in the coming weeks.
At the same time, Hamas has said it's ready to discuss “freezing or storing” its arsenal of weapons as part of its ceasefire with Israel, offering a possible formula to resolve one of the thorniest issues in the U.S.-brokered agreement.
Netanyahu and Trump are expected to meet in the coming weeks.
The developments are significant steps toward peace in a region that has been devastated by two years of war that has killed at least 70,360 Palestinians, according to Gaza’s Health Ministry, which operates under the Hamas-run government. The ministry does not differentiate between civilians and combatants, but says that nearly half the dead have been women and children. The ministry is part of Gaza’s Hamas government and its numbers are considered reliable by the U.N. and other international bodies. The Health Ministry also says over 370 Palestinians have been killed in continued Israeli strikes since the ceasefire took effect.
The war started when Hamas-led militants attacked Southern Israel, leaving around 1,200 people dead and abducting 251 others.
Israel’s military shot and killed one man Sunday night in the Israeli-occupied West Bank. Officials said he was throwing rocks at soldiers with two other people, one of whom was arrested. while Palestinian health officials said they shot and wounded the other man. The military said no soldiers were injured.
Palestinian authorities identified the man killed as a 19-year-old man from the northern city of Qalqilya.
Associated Press writer Josef Federman in Doha, Qatar, contributed to this report.
Hamas militants and Egyptian workers accompanied by members of the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) head to Zeitoun neighborhood of Gaza City to search for the remains of deceased hostages, Monday, Dec. 8, 2025. (AP Photo/Jehad Alshrafi)
FILE - People carry sacks and boxes of food and humanitarian aid that was unloaded from a World Food Program convoy that had been heading to Gaza City in the northern Gaza Strip, June 16, 2025. (AP Photo/Jehad Alshrafi, File)
FILE - Palestinians grab sacks of flour from a moving truck carrying World Food Programme aid as it drives through Deir al-Balah in central Gaza, Nov. 15, 2025. (AP Photo/Abdel Kareem Hana, File)
Israeli police and officials hang an Israeli flag on the compound of the United Nations agency for Palestinian refugees in East Jerusalem, after Israel police forcibly entered the compound, Monday, Dec. 8, 2025. (AP Photo/Mahmoud Illean)
FILE - Offices of the United Nations agency for Palestinian refugees, known as UNRWA, are seen in the Shuafat refugee camp in Jerusalem, Monday, Jan. 27, 2025. (AP Photo/Mahmoud Illean, File)
