Polls show Trump's approval rating 'stabilized' but underwater

Matthew Medsger, Boston Herald on May 6, 2025

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President Donald Trump’s international trade war may not be as popular as he might wish, but his approval rating hasn’t suffered as a consequence, new polling shows.

According to a Morning Consult survey of more than 2,200 registered voters, Trump’s approval rating has “stabilized” but remains underwater.

“Sentiment about Trump’s job performance has stabilized, with 46% approving, up 1 percentage point from last week, and his disapproval rating unchanged at 52%,” they wrote.

The pollsters found that the president’s current approval rating is a reversal from where he started in January, when 52% of voters approved of his work in those early days and just 45% disapproved.

Also, they note that “his net approval rating is slightly worse than it was at the same point in his first term, when 44% approved and 48% disapproved.”

“Trump began his second term by matching a record-high 52% approval from March 2017, but voters have steadily soured on his job performance since his second inauguration,” they wrote.

An Economist/YouGov poll of 1,850 adults asked respondents if they “have a favorable or an unfavorable opinion” of the 47th president, finding only 42% view him very or somewhat favorably, compared to 53% who view him very or somewhat negatively.

An I&I/TIPP poll of 1,400 adults conducted online from the end of April to the first couple of days in May found opinions of the president veer slightly negative, but not quite as deep as the poll’s margin of error.

“Overall, 44% assessed Trump’s presidential performance as ‘favorable,’ while 46% described it as ‘unfavorable,’” they wrote. “With a +/-2.7 percentage point margin of error, that’s a statistical toss-up. And only 7% answered ‘not familiar enough to say,’ while an even-smaller 3% margin said they were not sure.”

According to the Morning Consult survey, voters are not happy with Trump’s tariff policies, and are more likely to disapprove than approve by a 7-point margin. Pollsters note this marks “a record low in surveys conducted since he took office in January.”

However, respondents don’t feel the same way about Trump’s handling of the U.S. economy itself, according to that poll, “highlighting a rare decoupling of views on Trump’s handling of those issues.”

They wrote, “Voters are most likely to want Trump to focus on lowering prices for goods and services, and specifically health care affordability, following a campaign that was dominated by voters’ concerns about inflation.”

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