Politics

President Donald Trump’s Final Job Approval Rating Average Is Lowest Ever, New Poll Shows

(Photo by Drew Angerer/Getty Images)

Brianna Lyman News and Commentary Writer
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President Donald Trump has the lowest job approval rating average than any other president just as he prepares to leave the White House, according to a new poll.

Thirty-four percent of Americans approve of the job Trump is doing as president, which is his worst evaluation during his presidency, according to a Gallup poll released Tuesday. Trump’s average approval rating is 41%, the lowest average of any other president in Gallup polling history, according to the poll. The average for all presidents is 53%, according to Gallup.

The poll was conducted between Jan. 4-15 among a random sample of 1,023 adults with a margin of error of +/- 4 percentage points.

While his overall approval rate was low, 82% of Republicans polled said they approved of Trump’s job while only 4% of Democrats and 30% of independents said the same.

Throughout his time in office, Trump averaged an 88% approval rating among Republicans and just an average of 7% among Democrats, according to Gallup. Trump’s 88% approval rating among Republicans is a record-setter, with no president having a higher job approval rating during his own term among his own party supporters than Trump, who is tied with President Dwight D. Eisenhower, according to the poll.

Other presidents, however, had job approval ratings among their party members also above the 80% threshold, according to Gallup. (RELATED: Poll: Nearly Two-Thirds Of Americans Say Country Is Headed In The Wrong Direction, Double-Digit Spike Since December)

WASHINGTON, DC - DECEMBER 31: U.S. President Donald Trump walks to the Oval Office while arriving back at the White House on December 31, 2020 in Washington, DC. President Trump and the First Lady returned to Washington, DC early and will not be in attendance at the annual New Years Eve party at his Mar-a-Lago home in Palm Beach. (Photo by Tasos Katopodis/Getty Images)

WASHINGTON, DC – DECEMBER 31: U.S. President Donald Trump walks to the Oval Office while arriving back at the White House on December 31, 2020 in Washington, DC.  (Tasos Katopodis/Getty Images)

Trump’s presidency got off to a rough start, becoming the first president in Gallup’s polling history to receive an initial job approval rating that was lower than majority levels, according to Gallup. A Jan. 23 poll from 2017 found only 45% of Americans approved of the job he was doing, despite the fact that he was only days into his presidency.

That same year Trump’s approval rating hit 35% three times when the Justice Department charged several members of Trump’s 2016 campaign for allegedly being involved with Russia during the campaign, according to Gallup.

Trump received his highest approval ratings in 2020, hitting 49% approval twice.

Just after his impeachment trial ended, Trump scored a 49% approval rating in February, according to Gallup. Gallup noted his approval rating rose because Republicans and Independents gave higher ratings, with Republicans up 6% from January. Fifty-percent of Americans disapproved of Trump, according to the same poll.

Just one month later Trump’s job approval rating also hit 49%, according to Gallup. In early March his approval rating was 44%, but jumped by the end of the month as the nation battled the beginning of the coronavirus.

By June, however, his approval rating fell to 38% as the nation erupted into protests over racial injustice, according to Gallup.