Polls, polls, polls. Not that it matters …
by digby
As we head into the fourth week of the Government shutdown, the longest in US history, some new polls show Trump and the GOP are losing the PR battle. But Trump doesn’t care. He obviously believes that if he just makes America suffer enough, that uppity Speaker will come crawling. And then he will be a big hero to his base. They love hurting people.
The share of Americans who regard the shutdown as “very serious” now stands at a new high of 50 percent, the HuffPost/YouGov survey finds, up from 29 percent in an initial survey taken just before Christmas.
CNN also has this:
Overall, the President’s approval rating in the poll stands at 37% approve to 57% disapprove. Disapproval has risen five points since December, while his approval number has held roughly the same. Trump’s current approval rating matches Ronald Reagan’s at this point in his presidency. January of 1983 was the only time during Reagan’s tenure when his approval rating fell below 40%, according to Gallup. Trump has hit a low point of 35% in CNN’s polling two times — in December 2017 and February 2018 — and has been at 40% or above just nine times out of the 20 CNN has polled on it.
37%.
The survey found 56 percent of voters say Trump and Republicans are responsible for the shutdown while 36 percent blame Democrats. The two sides have reached an impasse over Trump’s request for $5 billion to build a wall along the U.S.-Mexico border.
[…]
In a separate question, 62 percent of voters opposed shutting down the government to force funding for the wall, with 32 percent in favor. Republicans were the only group who supported a shutdown. About two-thirds of voters disapprove of Trump using executive powers to fund the wall.On the issue of the wall itself, 55 percent of voters oppose building a wall along the Mexican border while 43 percent are in favor. But voters agree, by a margin of 54-43 percent, that there is a security crisis along the Mexican border and, by a margin of 68-26 percent, that there is a humanitarian crisis there.
“While they believe there is both a humanitarian and a security crisis along the southern border, they absolutely don’t think a wall will solve the problem,” Malloy said.
None of this matters to Trump who only sees what makes him feel better about himself:
Over the last 24 hours, Trump has privately touted a Washington Post-ABC News poll indicating that public support for a border wall has increased to 42% from 34% last year, a source familiar with his comments told CNN.
“He’s not going to budge even 1 inch,” a source familiar with the President’s mindset told CNN.