How do Americans view Trump’s presidency? It gets better with time apart, poll finds
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In recent years, Donald Trump’s presidency has undergone a sea change in public opinion — transforming from screw-up to success in the eyes of most Americans, new polling reveals.
In August 2017, during his first year in the White House, just 24% of respondents in a CNN poll labeled his presidency a success, while 68% considered it a failure.
Four years later, in a similar poll conducted shortly before he left office, 41% considered his presidency a success, and 55% said it was a failure.
Now, a new CNN poll found 55% of respondents view Trump’s first term as a success, marking a more than doubling in the share of Americans who view his first term favorably in seven years.
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Less than half of respondents, 44%, now view his first term as a failure.
The poll, conducted between April 18 and 23, sampled 1,212 respondents and has a margin of error of 3.4 percentage points.
This marked shift in public opinion has some historical precedent, with numerous other presidents experiencing higher favorability ratings after leaving office.
A July poll by Gallup found that the retrospective approval ratings of nearly every modern president were higher than their average approval rating in office.
“Only (Richard) Nixon’s and (Barack) Obama’s current ratings are not significantly higher than their initial retrospective ratings,” the poll found.
The new CNN poll also revealed that 39% of respondents view President Joe Biden’s first term as a success, while 61% view it as a failure.
A similar poll conducted in January and February 2022 found 41% of respondents considered his first term a success, while 57% considered it a failure.
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