Poll: President Donald Trump’s Approval Rating At 35 Percent In Wake Of Hurricane Harvey, May Keep Sliding

A new Gallup poll finds President Donald Trump’s approval rating has stalled at just 35 percent in the aftermath of Hurricane Harvey, and if history is any indicator, it could soon be dipping even lower.

With polls showing just over one in three voters now approve of the president’s job performance, Gallup notes the sliding numbers represent some of the lowest numbers the still newly elected commander-in-chief has registered since taking over the Oval Office in January.

With Hurricane Harvey still wreaking havoc across Texas, where many remain without power and as many as 30,000 are now staying in shelters, things could get worse before they get better for the president.

Newsweek reports both Presidents George W. Bush and Barack Obama saw their numbers sharply decline in the wake of similar disasters in their own administrations that left each of them heavily criticized over their handling of the situations.

In the case of Bush, his numbers never fully recovered after Hurricane Katrina tore through Louisiana, leaving that area decimated for years.

In the immediate hours after the storm hit, Trump was already under heavy criticism, with many charging that he used the national disaster that gripped the attention of most of the nation as a time to ram through some of his more controversial moves.

Over the last 72 hours, the President has announced via Twitter the presidential pardoning of convicted former Arizona Sheriff Joe Arpaio and that polarizing White House staffer Sebastian Gorka was leaving the administration.

The president is now planning to visit Texas on Tuesday for a first-hand look at all the devastation.

Meanwhile, news that Trump sought to build a Trump Tower in Russia at the heart of the 2016 presidential campaign run is also raising eyebrows. The Washington Post reports Trump worked closely with a Russian real-estate baron in trying to finalize the deal.

The Post reports developer Felix Sater urged Trump to come to Moscow to promote the deal at one point, assuring him that it was virtually a given he could get President Vladimir Putin to say “great things” about him. Sater is also reported to have exchanged emails with Trump attorney Michael Cohen, where he allegedly boasted the two would soon be celebrating “one of the biggest residential projects in real estate history and Donald Trump’s election as president.”

As far back as 2007, the Post reports, Trump had an eye cast toward Russia.

“Russia is one of the hottest places in the world for investment,” he said in a court deposition back then. “We will be in Moscow at some point,” he added.

[Featured Image by Alex Edelman/Getty Images]