CNN senior data reporter Harry Enten said the American people blame President Joe Biden for the “awful” economic polling numbers on Thursday’s “CNN Newsroom.”
A recent CNN poll found that 77% of Americans believe current economic conditions are bad, while only 23% said it is good. The poll surveyed 1,007 adults between April 29-May 1 with a 3.9% margin of error. Host Ana Cabrera pointed out “most Americans are not happy” with the current economic state.
“I was going to use the word awful,” Enten replied. “Essentially if you ask Americans how they view the economy, they say poor or good, look at the percentage that say poor at this time. It is north of 70%, it is 77% that say bad, bad! Just 23% say good. You got to go all the way back to 2012 to see numbers that bad and it’s not much of a surprise if you ask folks ‘what’s the most important problem facing the country right now?’ What is the top issue? The economy!”
“At the top by 55% and I looked across our poll, across 20 different demographic groups, political groups. The economy was the most important issue across all of them.”
Cabrera asked Enten who most Americans blame for the worsening economy. Enten replied that the public currently blames the Biden administration and the Democratic Party, then cited the poll finding that 81% of Americans say the U.S. government is doing “too little” to combat inflation, 15% saying the “right amount,” and only 4% “too much.” (RELATED: POLL: Biden Approval Craters Again)
“They blame the Democrats, they blame Biden, but they really blame inflation,” he said. “I mean, that’s really what’s cooking here, right? We were talking about that…I truthfully look at polling data all day, you just never see that many Americans agreeing on something [by] 81% too little. Awful number.”
“Do they feel that President Biden is doing enough to combat that?” Cabrera asked.
“No, no they do not,” Enten continued. “And this to me is the most worrisome sign if you’re a Democrat. You essentially say ‘ok, has President Biden’s policies affected, how has it affected you in U.S. economic conditions? Look at that, 55% say he’s worsened the conditions. That’s up from where we were at the end of last year. An awful number, so not only do they think the economy is bad, they think Biden is contributing to the bad economy. Bad numbers.”
Only 19% of Americans said the president improved economic conditions and 26% said he had no effect, the poll found. Among Democrats, only 7 in 10 (71%) approve of Biden’s handling of the economy.
Enten recently cited four polls finding Biden approval ratings ranging between 33%-42%, the lowest numbers of any president at this point in their presidency.