Americans Sour On Trump Ahead Of State Of The Union, Polls Find

President Donald Trump is facing abysmal approval ratings as he prepares to address the nation on Tuesday, according to a series of new polling released this week.

Only 39 percent of Americans approve of the way Trump is handling the job of president, according to a Washington Post-ABC News-Ipsos poll released on Sunday. The poll also found that 47 percent of Americans “strongly disapprove” of Trump.

His disapproval is rising among independents, in particular. In a separate CNN survey released on Monday, only 26 percent of independents surveyed approve of his handling of the presidency — a 15 point drop from a February 2025 poll.

When it comes to some of the administration’s key priorities, respondents also disapprove of Trump’s approach.

Fifty-eight percent of adults in the Washington Post-ABC News-Ipsos poll said they disapprove of the way Trump is handling immigration — once his signature issue — while 57 percent said they disapprove of the way Trump is managing the economy. Sixty-five percent said they disapprove of the way he is handling inflation and 64 percent said they disapprove of the way he is dealing with tariffs.

Only 38 percent of adults said Trump’s policies are moving the country in the right direction, according to the CNN poll.

In a statement, White House spokesman Davis R. Ingle said the "ultimate poll” was on Election Day in 2024.

“The ultimate poll was November 5th 2024 when nearly 80 million Americans overwhelmingly elected President Trump to deliver on his popular and commonsense agenda,” Ingle said. “The President has already made historic progress not only in America but around the world. It is not surprising that President Trump remains the most dominant figure in American politics.”

Trump on Monday also appeared to dismiss recent polling showing Americans’ disapproval.

“I had polls for the election that showed I was going to get swamped, and I won in a landslide,” Trump said during a ceremony at the White House. “They were fake polls. I saw [a fake poll] today, that I'm at 40 percent. I'm not at 40 percent. I'm at much higher than that. I mean I'd love to run against anybody. The real polls say you'd kill anybody, it wouldn't even be close.”

Trump’s low approval ratings come as he is set to address the nation from the Capitol on Tuesday in his State of the Union address. Polling from NPR/PBS/Marist University released on Monday shows that 57 percent of Americans think the state of the union is not very strong or not strong at all.

The disapproval is split along party lines, with 79 percent of Democrats saying the state of the union is not strong and 77 percent of Republicans saying it is “on solid ground.”

Democrats and independents also agree that the nation is worse off today than it was last year. The NPR/PBS/Marist poll found that six-in-ten respondents — including 90 percent of Democrats and 68 percent of independents — say the nation is worse off than it was a year ago. Conversely, 82 percent of Republicans think the country is better off now than it was last year.

More than half of the respondents told CNN that they would like Trump to address the economy or cost of living during his speech on Tuesday.

While Trump’s approval rating among Republicans remains strong, there has been a bit of a dip. In the CNN survey, 82 percent of Republicans approved of the job he was doing, down 8 points from a year ago. And the Washington Post survey found that 48 percent of Republicans “approve strongly” of his performance, down from 63 percent a year ago.

The Washington Post-ABC News-Ipsos poll was conducted Feb. 12-17 among 2,589 adults, with a margin of error of plus or minus 2 percentage points. The CNN poll of 2,496 adults was conducted by SSRS from February 17-20, with a margin of sampling error of plus or minus 2.5 percentage points. The NPR/PBS News/Marist Poll of 1,462 adults was conducted January 27-30, with a margin of error of plus or minus 2.9 percentage points.

For each survey, smaller subgroups would have a larger margin of error.