A new poll found that more than two-thirds of the American electorate disapproves of how President Donald Trump is handling his job as president.
The Associated Press-NORC poll, published on Thursday, finds the president’s popularity at the lowest recorded during his presidency, with just 35 percent approving of his performance. An average of other major and recent polls puts Trump’s disapproval rating at a less severe 54.4 percent; however, across the board, these polls reflect that more than half of the electorate are unapproving of the president.
Rather than focus on the AP poll, however, Trump shared a recent Rasmussen poll, which put his approval rating at 50 percent—far higher than the AP poll’s finding or the average of most recent polls. Rasmussen is often an outlier that consistently shows Trump with higher approval ratings than most other polls.
Great news! #MAGA pic.twitter.com/pirHR7lAyT
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) June 16, 2017
The AP questionnaire worked to get to the bottom of what motivated or informed that disapproval, finding that 65 percent of respondents believed that Trump had no respect for democratic institutions.
The AP poll found that nine in every 10 Democrats and six in every 10 independents agreed that Trump disrespected the country’s democratic institutions—but, in a particularly revealing result, a third of Republican participants said the same—one in four going so far as to entirely disapprove of him as president.
This extraordinary new dip in popularity follows drastic policy action. In the past two months, House Republicans have voted to repeal parts of the Affordable Care Act and Trump announced his plan to withdraw from the Paris Climate Accord.
Even the president’s conservative supporters are significantly split on his approach to these areas, 33 percent of Republicans disapproved of his handling of healthcare and 28 percent of his handling of foreign policy and climate change.
In addition to the policy issues weighing on Trump, the president is also reportedly under investigation for attempts to obstruct the FBI investigation into Russia‘s election meddling–a detail the president appeared to confirm on Friday morning.
