Donald Trump Approval Rating Crashes To New Low Even In New Fox News Poll, Trump’s Base Voters Falling Away
Even in a new poll conducted by his favorite TV news network, Fox News, Donald Trump saw his approval rating crash to a new low on Wednesday, as the poll showed American voters giving Trump dismal grades not only on his overall performance in the nation’s top job, but also on a number of high-profile issues and crises that Trump has faced over recent weeks.
But perhaps most alarming for Trump, the Fox News poll showed that Trump’s approval rating among groups that have given him his most loyal support is now slipping away.
In the 2016 presidential election, analysts believe that Trump’s overwhelming victory among white men without college degrees was essential to his ability to put together the Electoral College win that gave him the White House, despite losing the popular vote to Democrat Hillary Clinton by nearly 3 million votes.
Trump won 71 percent of white men who did not graduate college in the election last year, according to a Fox News exit poll taken on election day — but in the new Fox News poll, Trump’s approval rating with those voters plunged to 56 percent, down from 68 percent just one month ago.
According to exit polling data from Pew Research Center, Trump won non-college white men with 67 percent of their votes in the election, compared to only 28 percent who voted for Clinton. That’s the largest margin of victory in that demographic of any presidential candidate since Ronald Reagan in 1980.
Trump’s overall approval rating in the Fox News poll dropped to just 38 percent. That’s down from 42 percent in September and a startling 10-point drop from the first Fox News approval rating poll of the Trump term, taken in February.
Trump’s approval also plummeted with another important group of supporters who have counted themselves among Trump’s base voters — white evangelical Christians. Only last month 74 percent — about three out of four — of white evangelicals said that they approved of Trump’s job performance in the Oval Office. But that number shrunk by eight points in October, to 66 percent support.
One month ago, almost half of all voters surveyed by Fox News, 49 percent, said that they approved of the way Trump was handling the economy — but in October only 44 percent approved of Trump on the economy, the worst number on that issue yet recorded by Fox News.
On his response to the Puerto Rico environmental crisis after Hurricane Maria, last week Trump himself scored his performance a “10” on a scale of 10. But voters surveyed by Fox News disagreed, with a mere 32 percent saying that they approved of how Trump has responded to the Puerto Rico disaster.
Trump also received dismal marks from voters in the Fox News poll on health care (33 percent approve), taxes (37 percent), North Korea (35 percent), and Iran (34 percent).
Other polls released on Wednesday also carried bad news for Trump and his approval rating. A new The Economist/YouGov poll showed Trump with just 37 percent overall approval, while the latest Gallup daily tracking poll showed Trump at only 36 percent approval.
In the respected Gallup poll, Trump’s approval rating has remained underwater at below 40 percent for an extraordinary 21 straight weeks. In his eight years in office, President Barack Obama did not have a single week when his approval dipped below 40 percent in the Gallup poll.
[Featured Image by Andrew Harnik/AP Images]
