New Poll Finds Only 12 Percent of Democrats Say Joe Biden Should Lead the Party – And Almost No One Likes McConnell
AP Photo/Patrick Semansky
A new AP-NORC poll out this week offered more bad news for President Joe Biden, who despite encouraging economic data, still struggles to convince Democrats he should be leading the party in 2024. Notably, the poll was conducted before Biden’s State of the Union address.
The poll asked U.S. adults who identify as Democrats, who “the leader of the Democratic Party is.” Given 7 possible answers, including “no one” and “no answer,” only 41 percent replied: Joe Biden. Rep. Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) and Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY) each came with 7 percent, while House Minority Leader Hakeem Jefferies (D-NY) received only 3 percent.
“Other Response” received 10 percent, while “no one” got 4 percent, and 27 percent said “no answer.”
From there the data only went downhill for Biden, as the poll asked the same group, “Who should lead the Democratic Party?”
Biden received only 12 percent support, followed by Jeffries, Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-VT), and Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY) — who all received 5 percent. “Other response” and “No Answer” landed with 21 percent and 37 percent respectively.
The poll’s summary noted that the overall results found a large percentage of Americans were unenthusiastic about the leaders of their respective parties. “A third of Democrats and Republicans are unsure of who they want leading their party, and there’s not a clear leader on either side who attracts far-reaching support,” the summary noted.
The GOP showed similar results with only 18 percent believing that Donald Trump is currently the leader of the party. Speaker of the House Kevin McCarthy (R-CA) received 11 percent acknowledgment as leader of the party.
When asked who should lead the party, 22 percent of Republican respondents said Florida Governor Ron DeSantis. 20 percent of GOP respondents said Trump should lead the party. “Other response” and “No answer” came in with 21 percent and 34 percent – respectively.
Lackluster support for Biden’s leadership comes as the poll also found “Democrats have consistently approved of Biden’s job performance, and Republicans have just as consistently disapproved. In the latest poll, 77% of Democrats approve of how the president is handling his job, along with only 9% of Republicans.”
The one thing Americans do seem to agree on is that Congress is doing a bad job, as only “only 19% of adults have a positive view of Congress’ job performance, including 20% of Democrats and 17% of Republicans. Seventy-nine percent disapprove.”
McConnell comes in with the worst numbers of any major leader of either party, with only 10 percent of Democrats and 21 percent of Republicans having a favorable view of his leadership. Notably, 50 percent of Republicans said they view him unfavorably.
The poll was conducted between January 26-30 among 1,068 adults and has a margin of error of 4.2 percent.
