NEW POLL: Biden Approval Hits a 9 Month High … Of 42 Percent
AP Photo/Patrick Semansky, File
President Joe Biden’s approval rating for the first week of March nudged up to its highest level since last June, in a recent poll by Reuters/Ipsos. Unfortunately for him, that number was still underwater at 42 percent.
The poll was conducted nationwide of 1,023 adults, “using a nationally represented sample,” according to Reuters, and had a margin of error of +/- 3 points.
Biden’s approval rating in February was at 41 percent, so this latest poll is just a one-point bump. It was as low as 36 percent last July.
The partisan breakdown on the poll was predictably divergent, with 81 percent of Democrats giving Biden a thumbs up and only 10 percent of Republicans saying they approved of his performance.
This latest “small upswing” in the president’s polling numbers comes as inflation is easing, Reuters reported, with the increase in consumer prices slowing down.
Still, as Reuters noted, “Biden’s approval also remains quite low by historic standards” — a challenge for the 80-year-old as he is seriously considering launching a re-election campaign for 2024:
In past decades, presidents only occasionally went through extended periods with approval as low as that of Biden, although Donald Trump spent much of his 2017-2021 presidency with similar levels of approval and at points sank even lower, hitting 33% in December 2017.
The poll also asked several policy questions, with 81 percent of Democrats and 29 percent of Republicans saying they supported Biden’s student loan forgiveness program, which is being challenged in court.
Regarding making it more difficult for migrants arriving at the U.S.-Mexico border to seek asylum, 84 percent of Republicans and 35 percent of Democrats said they supported making it harder.
When asked if they supported federal courts banning mifepristone, a medication used for miscarriages and abortions, 82 percent of Democrats and 53 percent of Republicans were opposed to court intervention that would overturn the federal government approval of the drug.
