The new Pew Poll shows Trump’s overall approval slipping to 38%, most precipitously among younger, Hispanic and Asian voters. (I still don’t know what they were thinking last year …)
Meanwhile:
His personality traits aren’t wearing well either. Most interestingly, views of his mental sharpness are finally going negative (as they should have been for years.)
Public assessments of Trump on several personal traits are also more negative than they were in 2024. Fewer now say he cares about the needs of ordinary people (37% today, 42% last summer), is a good role model (29% now, 34% then) or is mentally sharp (48% now, 53% then).
Ed Kilgore’s analysis gets it right:
All in all, the Trump coalition appears to be melting back toward the hard-core GOP base of grumpy old white folks. The disillusionment of significant numbers of 2024 Trump voters has several apparent sources. The best known involve the priorities he has set in his second term as president. Like most other pollsters, Pew finds Trump’s approval underwater on a long list of issues. They discern at least some confidence in Trump’s leadership on a few issues (e.g., negotiating favorable trade agreements and using military force wisely) and little at all in others (e.g., making good decisions on health-care policy and “bringing the country together”). Assessments of his One Big Beautiful Bill Act remain a bit in flux (23 percent of Americans, and the same percentage of Republicans, are “not sure” how they feel about it), but the percentage strongly disapproving of the megabill (33 percent) is a lot bigger than the percentage strongly approving (11 percent). Another Trump “accomplishment” Pew looked at closely was his tariff program, which remains very unpopular, with 61 percent of Americans and 32 percent of Republicans disapproving.
So despite all the beltway hoopla about all of Trump’s alleged “winning” on every front, it doesn’t appear that the public is very impressed. He’s even starting to lose altitude with many of his own voters.
I’m not sure Republicans care much about public opinion anymore now that they’ve decided they have begun a new Thousand Year Reich, but assuming they haven’t quite gotten that accomplished it’s good to see that they haven’t been able to totally pull the wool over the country’s eyes just yet.l