Donald Trump’s Approval Ratings Remain Steady Despite The Worst Week Of His Presidency
Donald Trump’s approval ratings remain steady, despite the previous week being arguably the words in his presidency, NBC News is reporting.
This past week saw the conviction of former Trump campaign manager Paul Manafort on eight criminal counts. Further, his former attorney, Michael Cohen, pleaded guilty to multiple criminal charges. Both Manafort’s and Cohen’s legal developments could spell doom for the 45th president, and by some measures, his days may even be numbered.
Nevertheless, throughout the storm of bad news for the president, his approval ratings have remained steady.
According to the most recent NBC News/Wall Street Journal poll, the number of Americans who approve of Trump’s job as president stands at 46 percent, give or take a few points for the margin of error.
That’s not necessarily good news for the president, however. Though steady during a week of terrible news, his approval ratings still hover below 50 percent. What’s more, his approval rating has not exceeded 50 percent at any point in his presidency, except according to one August 2018 Rasmussen poll that made the claim that he was more popular than Barack Obama at this point in his presidency. That poll is widely suspect, however, considering Rasmussen’s polling methods and the fact that Rasmussen is admittedly biased towards conservatives, according to this Inquisitr report from the time.
What's Donald Trump doing this weekend? https://t.co/SvPie5noej via @MotherJones
— Stephanie Mencimer (@smencimer) August 26, 2018
Democratic pollster Peter Hart and his team at Hart Research Associates says that Trump’s approval ratings signify that any effort at impeachment remains premature at best.
“[This week’s news] represents a fools gold opportunity rather than a silver bullet solution.”
Meanwhile, the poll reveals some distrust of the president that extends beyond his steady approval ratings.
For example, fewer than half of voters – 44 percent – believe that Trump has been “truthful” about the Mueller probe. Further, when poll respondents were asked if the people so far who have pleaded guilty or been convicted in the Mueller probe were likely to implicate Trump, 27 percent say that those crimes were limited to the individuals committing them; 40 percent say that Trump may have been involved in wrongdoing; and 30 percent say they don’t know.
When asked about the president’s honesty, even political affiliation failed to spare the president from the belief that he’s not completely honest. 86 percent of Democrats, perhaps not unexpectedly, strongly believe that Trump has not been honest. But perhaps surprisingly, only 46 percent of Republicans strongly agree that Trump has been honest.
In other bad news for Trump, pollsters found that looking towards the 2018 mid-term elections, 50 percent of voters say they hope Democrats take over Congress, while 42 percent say they want Republicans to hold on to both houses of Congress.
