Rahm Emanuel’s Approval Rating Just 19 Percent

Rahm Emanuel’s approval rating is just 19 percent, according to a Crain’s/Ipsos poll, which was put out on Thursday.

The poll also says that only two percent of Rahm’s constituents strongly approve of the Chicago mayor’s job performance.

The results show that the mayor’s approval rating has taken a big hit since voters were last surveyed in September, reports NBC News.

The lack of approval doesn’t mean that more of Rahm Emanuel’s constituents are disapproving of him. That number moved from 33 to 35 percent. Instead, the big changes happened in the “mixed feelings category.

The results mean that Rahm’s approval rating has gone from plus four in September to minus 16 in February. It’s possible that the Chicago Teachers Union battle caused the approval rating changes.

He has also pushed for reform for government worker pensions and has struggled to reverse a spike in murders in Chicago. The numbers are particularly interesting given the speculation that Rahm Emanuel is gearing up for a presidential run in 2016.

The Chicago Sun Times notes that Emanuel’s supporters dismissed the Crain’s/Ipsos poll, saying that the internet poll is unreliable and “way off” from what voters actually think.

The poll numbers could also spell risk for the Chicago mayor’s re-election campaign, should he choose to run again in 2015. While Rahm’s approval rating was 34 percent in September, it was just 19 percent in February. The disapproval rating moved up from 33 percent to 50 percent.

The remaining 29 percent are in the “undecided” category. Rahm’s political allies argued that internet polls have a huge margin of error because they are not based on a random sample. They also stated that the numbers from Thursday’s poll are contradictory to those gathered by Emanuel’s own pollsters. David Axlerod, Emanuel’s former White House colleague and a friend of 30 years, stated:

“His standing is far more robust than is reflected in this polling — both inside the city and outside. I’ve seen other polling … This poll is off to me in almost every way.”

Do you think Rahm Emanuel’s approval rating is really just 19 percent, or is the poll unreliable?