Monmouth University (“President’s Rating Hits Record Low“):
President Joe Biden’s job rating has hit an all-time low in the Monmouth (“Mon-muth”) University Poll, including particularly poor marks for his handling of immigration and inflation. Only 3 in 10 Americans say the incumbent is giving enough attention to the issues most important to them, which is worse than for his predecessor. The poll also finds congressional leadership ratings have dropped, with the new House speaker debuting in negative territory.
Public opinion of Biden’s overall job performance currently stands at 34% approve and 61% disapprove – his lowest rating in Monmouth’s polling since he took office. Since September, his approval number has dropped 4 points and his disapproval number has increased by 6 points. Between October 2022 and July 2023, Biden’s approval rating ranged between 40% and 44% while his disapproval number registered between 48% and 53%. Presidential approval has dropped among both Democrats (74%, down from 80% in September and 88% in July) and independents (24%, down from 30% in September and 38% in July); and it currently stands at just 5% among Republicans.
Here’s the trendline:
Monmouth is among the more reputable of the national polling firms but it’s notable that these numbers are lower than average. RealClearPolitics has Biden at 56.0 disapprove and 40.8 approve—and that includes the previous iteration on the Monmouth poll from earlier in the month as one of two low outliers. FiveThirtyEight has him at 55.4 disapprove, 39.0 approve.
Regardless, the main thing is the trend. Throwing out the bizarre 30 percent approval on Day 1, the numbers have gotten significantly worse. Even in our incredibly polarized era, he enjoyed several months of highish approval, but he’s been consistently underwater for over two years.
As with other polls, the economy seems to be the chief factor among many:
A majority of Americans disapprove of the way Biden has handled five different policy areas, results that are between one and six points worse than the last time Monmouth asked these questions. Specifically, just over 2 in 3 disapprove of the president’s performance on immigration (69%) and inflation (68%), while more than half feel the same about the way he has handled climate change (54%), jobs and unemployment (53%), and transportation and energy infrastructure (52%). While Biden’s fellow Democrats tend to approve of the job he has done in most of these areas, they are divided on his immigration efforts (50% approve and 47% disapprove). Also, while 62% of Democrats approve of how Biden has handled inflation, a sizable 35% disapprove.
[…]
Currently, 44% of Americans say they are struggling to remain where they are financially. Another 43% report being basically stable, while only 12% say their financial situation is improving. In the three years prior to the pandemic, the number of Americans who were struggling ranged between 20% and 29% while those who reported having improved finances ranged between 20% and 25%. When the COVID pandemic hit in March 2020, the number who said their finances were improving dropped to 11% but those who were struggling barely rose 26%, which was about on par with prior polling. This latter number remained basically steady throughout the pandemic and stood at 24% in June 2021, just a few months into the start of the current inflationary cycle. The number of Americans who said they were struggling increased to 42% as inflation peaked at about 9% in June 2022, but then went down to 37% in October 2022 as the rate of inflation started to ease. However, even though the inflation rate has continued to decline, the number of Americans who reported struggling started to increase again, hitting 41% in March of this year before registering 44% in the current poll.
Just 31% of the American public says Biden has been giving enough attention to the issues that are most important to their families. The vast majority (65%) wish he would give more attention to those issues. Just 11% of Republicans and 25% of independents say Biden is paying enough attention to their top concerns. Although a majority of Democrats (58%) feel he is paying the right amount of attention to their top issues, a sizable minority (41%) wish he would focus more on those concerns. As a point of comparison, former President Donald Trump got a relatively better evaluation on this metric in the year before the last presidential election; 41% said Trump was giving enough attention and 55% wished he would give more attention to their most important issues in a June 2019 poll.
None of that’s terribly shocking. While gas prices are down drastically from their Biden era peak, they’re still higher than when he took office. Food prices are up considerably. And new homes are unaffordable because of the highest interest rates in more than two decades. That the United States is doing better in the post-recession world than most other OECD countries doesn’t factor not what it is, at the end of the day, an emotional reaction.
This, however, is a bit strange:
Despite the fact that many Americans have a negative view of their current financial situation, most (58%) are optimistic about what their family’s financial situation will be 12 months from now. There are stark partisan differences in this view, however, with 80% of Democrats and just 37% of Republicans feeling optimistic. Independents are somewhat more likely to be optimistic (53%) than pessimistic (41%) about their financial status in a year’s time.
Whether that’s ultimately good news for Biden is hard to say.
As is customary, the President is out-polling Congress:
The Monmouth University Poll also finds that opinion of the job the U.S. Congress is doing stands at its worst mark in more than a year – 17% approve and 77% disapprove. Each of the three congressional leaders who were in office when Monmouth last polled on the leadership in July have seen their ratings go down, including among their fellow partisans. The U.S. Senate’s Republican Minority Leader Mitch McConnell earns the lowest overall rating (6% approve and 60% disapprove among American adults), and is the only leader to receive a net negative score from his fellow partisans (10% approve and 41% disapprove among Republicans). On the Democratic side, Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (21% approve and 41% disapprove overall and 48%-18% among Democrats) and House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries (21% approve and 22% disapprove overall and 45%-6% among Democrats) enjoy positive ratings among their fellow partisans if not among the public as a whole. Each of these three leaders have seen their approval ratings drop between 3 and 6 points and their disapproval ratings rise between 4 and 10 points since the summer.
As is also customary, the Veep is not super popular—although this one is unusually unpopular:
In other poll results, Vice President Kamala Harris receives a job rating of 35% approve and 57% disapprove, which is basically unchanged from September (36% favorable and 56% unfavorable).
The standard Right direction/Wrong track question:
Why it’s depicted in descending order escapes me. Regardless, while very much underwater, it’s noteworthy that it’s been that way for a very long time now:
That’s as far back as the poll shows. As you can see, the peak “Right direction” response was 40% and the lowest “Wrong track” response was 53%, both in June 2018.
