Donald Trump on the South Lawn of the White House on January 26, 2017. (Getty)
A new poll released on Thursday found that 35 percent of voters already think President Donald Trump should be impeached.
In this latest national poll from Public Policy Polling, a Democratic polling firm, 50 percent of respondents said they are opposed to impeaching Donald Trump less than one week into his presidency, but 35 percent said they are in favor of doing so. Among those who voted for Donald Trump, seven percent said they either support impeaching him or they’re not sure whether he should be impeached. Sixty-five percent of Hillary Clinton voters support impeachment, as do 34 percent of Jill Stein voters. Among Gary Johnson voters, though, only 20 percent support impeachment, and among those who didn’t vote for any of these candidates, 32 percent say Trump should be impeached and 32 percent say he shouldn’t.
Trump’s overall approval rating in this poll is 44 percent, an unusually low number for a new president. The poll also shows that there are some Americans who approve of the job Trump is doing but who don’t necessarily like him, as Trump’s unfavorable rating is higher than his disapproval rating; fifty percent of voters have a negative opinion of Donald Trump, but only 44 percent of them don’t approve of the job he’s doing.
Voters were also asked how Trump will compare to recent presidents, and they felt that he will be worse than all of them except Richard Nixon. The president who voters felt Trump is least likely to surpass is Ronald Reagan, with 57 percent of respondents saying Reagan will end up being the better president. Behind Reagan was Bill Clinton, who 51 percent of respondents say will be better than Trump. Voters were most split about Jimmy Carter, with 37 percent saying Trump will be better than Carter and 42 percent saying he will be worse. But 40 percent of voters said that Trump be superior to Richard Nixon, compared to 31 percent who said he’ll be worse than Nixon.
According to this poll, there is a fair amount of opposition to some of President Trump’s basic policy proposals. Sixty-one percent of respondents said they want to keep what works in Obamacare and fix what doesn’t work rather than repealing the whole law (31 percent of Trump voters also said this). This is as opposed to repealing the entire law and starting over, which is what Republicans currently plan to do; only 30 percent of respondents are in favor of this.
The general theme of this poll is that Trump’s base is still firmly behind him, but the president is not really winning over anyone who didn’t vote for him. It also shows that in many cases, those on the left and those on the right are in complete disagreement about basic facts. When asked if Donald Trump’s inauguration was more well-attended than Barack Obama’s, a plurality of Trump voters (43 percent) said Trump’s was bigger, while the overwhelming majority of Clinton voters said Obama’s was bigger. When asked if Trump’s inauguration was bigger than the Women’s March on Washington, 59 percent of Trump voters said the inauguration was bigger, while 86 percent of Clinton voters said the Women’s March was bigger. And when asked if most of the women who marched on Washington were paid to do so by George Soros (there is no evidence of this), a plurality of Trump voters (38 percent) said they were.
Also, when asked who is a more reliable news source, Donald Trump or CNN, 50 percent of voters overall said CNN, but 81 percent of Trump voters said the president is more reliable.
President Trump said this week that the southern border wall would likely be paid by taxpayers up front and then reimbursed by the Mexican government. This was seen by some as a betrayal of his campaign promise, but Trump voters generally don’t feel that way, with 65 percent of them saying that they still support building the wall even if Mexico doesn’t pay for it at first.
When asked if Donald Trump should be allowed to use a private e-mail server, the act that caused Trump to say that Hillary Clinton should be put in jail, 42 percent of Trump voters said he should be allowed to do so compared to 39 percent who said he shouldn’t be allowed to.
Finally, when it comes to Russia, 60 percent of voters overall have an unfavorable view of the country, but that dislike is stronger among Democrats than Republicans, with 20 percent of Trump voters having a favorable opinion of Russia.
Brendan Morrow is a Heavy contributor who covers news, politics, professional wrestling, and more. He has previously written about film for Bloody Disgusting, We Got This Covered, What Culture, and The Celebrity Cafe. Follow him on twitter @brendanmorrow.January 26, 2017 1:25 pm
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