New Delhi, Sept. 23 -- WASHINGTON - Diesel fuel has never cost more. The national average reached $6.53 a gallon this week, up from $3.69 a year ago, a 77 percent increase that has rippled through freight rates, corn-drying costs, and the margins of every business that moves goods by truck. On Tuesday, at the United Nations General Assembly in New York, Donald Trump said he had the answer.

He wants to stop selling diesel abroad.

Trump told reporters on the UNGA sidelines that he had pushed the idea inside the White House and that a decision would come "one way or another" within days. "I've said let's not send out the diesel," he said. Scott Bessent, the Treasury Secretary, added a qualification that will define whether the proposal sur...