The Poll is a Census
The country is not happy with Trump. Except for Republicans.
The flurry of polls as we approach the 100-day mark of the second Trump administration shows deep dissatisfaction with the direction of the country. But, with few exceptions, they mostly show the polarization of the country.
Four decades ago, the sociologist Donald Horowitz observed that, in deeply divided societies, elections tend to resemble an ethnic census. We seem to be in that position here on just about every issue, with party alignment substituting for ethnicity (granting that there is some significant overlap).
The AP/NORC poll (“100 days in and the public feels Trump’s presidency is proceeding mostly as expected“) shows this with the most clarity. The writeup tries to spin it differently:
The public broadly feels the first few months of the Trump administration’s second term are unfolding as expected. But nearly twice as many say President Trump is mostly focusing on the wrong priorities than say he’s focusing on the right ones.
About 100 days into his second term, 31% view Trump’s presidency as good or great, while about half have a negative view. Overall, 39% have a favorable opinion of how Trump has been handling his job and 58% have an unfavorable view. Immigration remains one Trump’s strongest policy issues and he garners higher approval than his handling of other issues like trade or the economy.
While most views of the president and his administration are filtered through a partisan lens, Republicans and Democrats are largely in agreement regarding their expectations for the new administration.
Eight in 10 Republicans and 7 in 10 Democrats are unsurprised by Trump and his policies in the first 100 days.
So, we have consensus! But, of course, Democrats expected it to be horrible and Republicans expected it to be great.
While there is agreement along party lines that Trump’s first few months are in line with expectations, partisan opinion diverges on the administration’s actions, priorities, and personnel.
A majority of the public disapproves of Trump overall as president (59% vs 39%). This is starkly divided along party lines. The partisan divide carries through to Trump’s performance on a range of issues with the majority of Democrats disapproving and the majority of Republicans approving. People unaffiliated with either of the major parties tend to be more positive than Democrats, but still just about 3 in 10 approve of Trump’s handling on most issues.
Only on trade negotiations is Republican approval below 70 percent. Meanwhile, there is no issue where Democrats are above 16 percent approval. Independents, whoever they might be, are somewhere in between but they’re definitely closer to Democrats on these issues: there’s not a single one with higher than 37 percent approval.
About half of the public thinks Trump has been a poor or terrible president so far in his second term, about 2 in 10 view his presidency as average, and 3 in 10 think is has been great or good.
Ahead of his inauguration in January, 37% expected he would be a great or good president, 46% thought he would be poor or terrible and 17% said he would be average.
Democrats are more consistent here: a whopping 72 percent think Trump has been “terrible,” with a charitable 12 percent giving him merely a “poor.” Republicans are less enthusiastic in the views, with only 41 percent rating him “great” and another 27 percent rating him “good.” Still, that’s more than two-thirds who are pretty satisfied. Once again, those who call themselves “Independents” are much, much closer to Democrats in their assessment.
There is no consensus on whether Trump has the right priorities, but many are skeptical. Forty four percent think Trump is focusing on the wrong priorities. A quarter think he has the right priorities and another 2 in 10 think his priorities are an even mix of right and wrong.
Again, this is divided along party lines. Half of Republicans feel that, for the most part, Trump’s priorities have been correct, compared with just 7% of Democrats and 9% of independents.
Once again, Democrats are much more enthusiastic, with three-quarters saying he’s focused on the wrong priorities; only a slight majority of Republicans think he’s mostly focused on the right priorities. If you add in those who say it’s “about an even mix,” though, you get to eighty percent.
All of this bodes well for Democrats retaking control of Congress in 2026, and likely doing well in state-level contests being held this November. Unfortunately, it makes it highly unlikely that Republican lawmakers will rein in Trump excesses except perhaps on the occasional 80 percent case.
Depending how his trade wars play out, especially the China war, his polling could change dramatically.
Negotiations become really problematical when no one expect you to honor your commitments.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/2025/04/27/trump-tariffs-us-economy/
snip
Polls are continually tricky. One issue seems to me is the identification of party affiliation or no affiliation. I’m no where near an expert but that identification seems to be very fluid.
Take, for example, Texas. When you register to vote, you don’t choose a party affiliation. We have an open primary system. If I vote in the Republican primary (which I did last year for very local reasons), then I’m a Republican for a year. I could also go to the local party and sign up with them. But if a pollster asked as part of the poll, I would probably say independent.
To me, this uncertainty would taint the results of any generalized polling. Each state would be different and if the nationwide poll takes the measure about about 1000 poll respondents, I would be doubtful of the results.
I think the polling firms know this but all that uncertainty is not expressed in the narratives accompanying the results.
@charontwo:
Yes, this is very cultural. Not just Trump but the Americans in general. When I was stationed in Japan, we shared the base with the Japanese Air Force. There were always a lot of meetings to work out the arrangements and issues. We Americans go to a meeting and the top officer would do most of the talking while us minions would sit on the side and wait for a question. The Japanese would have the minions do the talking and I would watch the consensus build until the top Japanese officer would then nod and concur. It was a fascinating contrast in styles.
Polls have their uses, but Democrats need to focus on elections. And history shows that they can’t trust polls to tell them: (i) who is going to vote; or (ii) how they are going to vote. (Caveat: the preceding assumes we are still going to HAVE elections in the future, and also that they will be “fair.” Neither is something Democrats should take for granted.)
@Scott:..Republican for a year…
I live in Illinois.
I vote in Illinois Primary elections all the time. Always select the Democratic Party ballot.
As far as I know that does not make me a member of the Democratic party.
My ballot choice is a matter of public record so I do get Democratic campaign material in the
US Mail and a few texts asking for my vote but so far no requests for money.
ETA: The last time anyone asked me if I was a Democrat or a Republican I told them that I am an anarchist. They got a perplexed look on their mug and left me alone.
We still haven’t seen how the American public would react if the economy truly tanks under Trump. Yes, it did in 2020, but he took surprisingly little blame for it–polls at the time found the public giving him poor marks on his handling of the pandemic, but positive marks on the economy. It seemed they viewed the virus as a black swan that he may have responded to poorly, but which didn’t negatively affect their views on his handling of the economy overall, as demonstrated by its supposed strength during his first three years. That was the narrative that persisted after he left office, and which led to the perception that the ensuing inflation was entirely on Biden’s head, rather than being seen as aftershock arising from the world emerging from the pandemic shutdown.
If the economy goes into recession in the current Trump term, of course Trump himself and his defenders will find people and things to blame it on, particularly Biden. But there’s no reason to think blaming one’s predecessor will work any better for him than it did for Biden, and this time he’ll have nothing external like Covid to point to as the culprit. Furthermore, his self-branding as the king of tariffs means it’s going to be hard making people forget there was a fundamental shift in economic policy since Biden left.
The downside is that it shows Trump still dominates the GOP and that the conservative media bubble remains impenetrable.
The non consecutive terms will earn the rapist the rank of worst and second worst individual ever to ocuppy the oval office. Scholars will argue for centuries which term was worse.
Since Trump still holds strong support within his party no one in the GOP is going to challenge him for fear of losing in the primary. Nothing much is going to change now. Maybe it means the GOP loses some seats in 2026 but I highly doubt enough to overcome a filibuster or veto and SCOTUS is locked in for a long time. I expect Thomas to get some quiet offers of financial support he will somehow forget to report again in return for retiring before Trump leaves office.
Steve
@steve:
He and possibly some of the other conservative justices will retire before the midterms, just as Kennedy did during Trump’s first term. Even though Republicans were considered a strong favorite for keeping the Senate in 2018, and they ultimately did, they recognized there was a big enough risk of losing it not to endanger their hold on SCOTUS. Dems did the same with Breyer in 2022. (Of course no one can “make” a justice retire, but let’s not kid ourselves that there was a lot of pressure.) Strategic retirement is the new normal (and it isn’t entirely new).
Let’s not normalize what’s happening by calling them Republicans. They are not.
Eisenhower was a Republican. Reagan was a Republican. The two Bush’s. John McCain. Republicans at least paid lip service to being Conservative.
These people are MAGA. MAGA is radical. MAGA is extremeist.
As this poll shows, Trump’s complete control over both the MAGA Party and the Government has an eerie parallel in 30’s Germany.
Just an aside, but perhaps related.
The effects on consumers from Trump’s policies haven’t hit yet. However they very well might. The container ports on the West coast are experiencing a dramatic decrease in shipping. Here’s an article about the suddenly empty container ship docks in Seattle, but there are other stories in the press about this happening in LA too. Fair guess is empty shelves at Wal Mart are in our near future. Shortages always lead to inflation.
Today’s polls are just for this moment, and change be a-comin’ shortly.
“Jay Kuo”
Lots more at the link
@charontwo:
That may well be, but the polls in this post show that more Democrats and independents approve of Trump on immigration than on any of the other 5 issues in the poll numbers above. It’s certainly not overwhelming support, but it does represent a statistically significant shift.
On the other hand, the fact that fewer Americans will disapprove of Trump on immigration is not all that surprising. Somebody’s gotta work in the hot sun picking crops and building our houses. As long as they don’t live in our neighborhoods and occupy the desk next to ours, too, we be good.
@dazedandconfused: I’ve already stocked up on my bulk toilet paper and paper towels/kleenexes. I’m sure my Fedex guy is cussing me, but at least the boxes were relatively light!
There’s an ad to be made about “How come every time Trump is President, there are shortages of toilet paper?!”
Also have an appointment at our local clinic this week to get my titer’s tested for my childhood vaccinations. I’ll be damned if I’ll die of a preventable disease in fucking 2025. I turn 50 the 5th, so I can get my shingles vaccine. I had chicken pox multiple times and I’ve seen shingles on people, fuck that noise.
I’ve commented that over thirty years the GOPs have very effectively constructed a tribe for their voters. I would identify them as the gullible tribe, but they see themselves as the Real American tribe. The election, and this polling, tell me this is indeed an “ethnic census”, that they have succeeded in othering not just ethnic/racial minorities, but also anyone who doesn’t think as they do. This includes white Christians of the wrong denomination including Catholics of insufficient fervor. And they’ve worked hard at making “liberals” the enemy.
If you don’t believe me, and don’t have MAGA friends or family, read the letters to the editor in red state newspapers, or comments at FOX or other conservative sites. They see us as foreign, at least not quite American.
@Daryl: You see a president popular in his own party and unpopular outside it and your first thought is Nazi Germany. You skip over hundreds of other comparisons. Your thinking isn’t healthy.
@gVOR10: The GOP has made record gains among racial minorities and Catholics.
@charontwo:
That was an interesting substack article. Thanks.
As to: at just 39 percent, the worst of any president at this point in his term in some 80 years of polling. Well, we havent had a president like Trump in about 190 years, since Andrew Jackson. So I’ve come to the point where I put very little stock in seeing Trump’s polling numbers through the lens of 80 years of polling. Trump is the ‘margin of error’ on steroids and Adderall.
Also, I believe that 40% approval represents basic MAGA support, so I see this polling (around 40%) to be an equilibrium for Trump, he most certainly doesn’t have to be anywhere near 50%. He’s a lame duck, he does not care about the Republican Party, and he’s been governing by Fiat anyway. Even if one of the chambers flips in the 2026 mid-term he will continue to act without Congress, albeit a Democratic House or Senate might be an irritant.