Trump Needs Just Eight Days For More Than Half of America To Disapprove of His Performance

Practically every President in the modern era has seen their disapproval rating creep over 50% at some point during their Presidency, though President Trump has blown out his competition when it comes to how long it took to reach the dubious mark.

Earlier this week, Gallup.com reported that President Trump has a current approval rating of 42% and a disapproval rating of 51%. This means that President Trump took just eight days for more than half of the country to disapprove of the job that he is doing as leader of the free world.

Every President since Gerald Ford has, at one point, seen his disapproval rating climb over 50%. Even President Reagan and President Clinton, who finished their time in the White House with approval ratings of over 60%, were more unpopular than popular during various points of their White House stays. President Reagan saw his disapproval rating hit 56% in early 1983, while President Clinton saw his disapproval rating hit 54% in 1994. Both men were able to turn things around and finish strong, with both benefitting from extremely strong economies.

While President Trump has certainly gotten off to a poor start (at least in terms of approval ratings), he is still nowhere near the levels of unpopularity that George W. Bush had to endure during the last year of his second term in office. At the height of the financial meltdown that preceded the "Great Recession", more than 70% of the nation disapproved of the job that President Bush was doing. This helped to pave the way for President Obama to win in November of 2008.

Most Presidents enjoy a "honeymoon" phase when they first move into the White House, though an extremely divisive and nasty election means that President Trump will enjoy no such gift.

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Something that "might" help to elevate President Trump's popularity (at least temporarily) would be if the country gets involved in a war or is the victim of some sort of calamitous terrorist attack.

Shortly after 9/11, President George W. Bush saw his approval rating soar to 90% as the country banded together following a heinous terrorist attack.

In 1991, the United States entered into the Gulf War, and this helped to lift President George H.W. Bush's approval rating to 89%.

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These are very unique times that we are living in right now, and it seems nearly impossible to ever imagine President Trump enjoying anything close to some of the approval ratings that were enjoyed by his predecessors, especially given the amount of animosity there is running throughout the country right now.

Source: Gallup.com

Filed under: General Knowledge