Poll position: How Trump’s approval rating compares to his presidential predecessors

There’s no denying that President Donald Trump is moving at warp speed during his second tour of duty in the White House.

“We have accomplished more in 43 days than most administrations accomplished in four years or eight years, and we are just getting started,” the president said during his prime-time address to Congress and the nation last month.

And a few days later, the White House team touted, “50 WINS IN 50 DAYS: President Trump Delivers for Americans.”

Trump has aggressively asserted executive authority in his second term, overturning long-standing government policy and making major cuts to the federal workforce through an avalanche of sweeping and controversial executive orders and actions – many aimed at addressing grievances he has held since his first term.

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But the most recent national public opinion polls suggest that Americans aren’t thrilled with the job the president is doing.

The latest Gallup poll, conducted April 1-14 and released on Thursday, indicates that Trump is underwater, with a 44% approval rating and 53% disapproval rating.

Most, but not all, of the most recent national public opinion surveys indicate Trump’s approval ratings in negative territory, which is a slide from the president’s poll position when he started his second tour of duty in the White House.

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Contributing to the slide are increasing concerns over the economy and inflation, which was a pressing issue that kept former President Joe Biden’s approval ratings well below water for most of his presidency. And Trump’s blockbuster tariff announcement two weeks ago, which sparked a trade war with some of the nation’s top trading partners, triggered a massive sell-off in the financial markets and increased concerns about a recession.

The Gallup poll is the latest to spotlight the massive partisan divide over the polarizing president.

Nine out of 10 Republicans questioned by Gallup gave Trump a thumbs up, but only 4% of Democrats said they approved of the president’s performance. Among Independents, only 37% approved of the job Trump’s doing steering the nation.

With the president reaching three months into his second term this weekend – he was inaugurated on Jan. 20 – Gallup is comparing his approval ratings with his presidential predecessors.

According to Gallup’s figures, Trump’s average approval rating during the first quarter of his first year back in office is 45%.

While that’s an improvement from his 41% average approval rating during the first three months of his first administration, in 2017, it’s far below previous presidents.

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“John F. Kennedy and Dwight Eisenhower had the highest first-quarter average ratings, with both registering above 70%, while Jimmy Carter, Barack Obama and Ronald Reagan averaged between 60% and 69%. George W. Bush, George H.W. Bush, Joe Biden and Bill Clinton had similar average ratings of 55% to 58% in their first quarters,” Gallup noted in its release. 

Gallup highlighted that “Trump is the only president to have sub-50% average approval ratings during a first quarter in office.”

But enjoying promising approval ratings out of the gate doesn’t guarantee a positive and productive presidency.

Carter’s poll numbers sank into negative territory less than two years into his presidency, and he was resoundingly defeated in his bid for re-election in 1980.

Biden’s approval rating hovered in the low-to-mid-50s during the first six months of his single term as president, with his disapproval in the upper 30s to the low- to-mid-40s. 

However, Biden’s numbers sank into negative territory in the late summer and autumn of 2021, in the wake of his much-criticized handling of the turbulent U.S. exit from Afghanistan, and amid soaring inflation and a surge of migrants crossing into the U.S. along the nation’s southern border with Mexico.

Biden’s approval ratings stayed underwater throughout the rest of his presidency, and he dropped his bid for re-election last summer.