'Blown all of his goodwill': Trump’s sinking approval boosts support for 'liberals, free trade'

05 May

When political pundits speak of a U.S. president's "honeymoon period," they are referring to the period of good will that presidents typically enjoy after entering the White House.

Honeymoon periods don't last, as Presidents Ronald Reagan, Barack Obama and Bill Clinton saw when their parties were clobbered during the midterms (Reagan in 1982, Obama in 2010 and Clinton in 1994). All of them, however, enjoyed strong reelection victories.

President Donald Trump, however, has a much different story. He is a rare example of a U.S. president serving two consecutive terms, and for Trump's second term, the "honeymoon period" ended much faster than it normally does.

Three and one-half months into his second term, Trump is seeing his approval ratings plummet. And his unpopularity is the focus of op-eds by Aaron Blake for the Washington Post and by Douglas E. Schoen and Carly Cooperman for The Hill.

Trump, Blake argues, is so unpopular that three things he dislikes — "liberals, free trade and immigration" — are gaining in popularity.

"For the second time in a matter of days," Blake explains, "President Donald Trump's bull-in-a-china-shop routine on the world stage appears to have spurred liberals to a big comeback win in a key ally's elections. First was Canada, where liberals surged thanks to an anti-Trump, anti-tariff and anti-'51st state' backlash — one that had the conservative leader squirming to distance himself from Trump."

Blake continues, "Then, over the weekend was Australia, where liberals also overturned a significant deficit from earlier this year and won in a landslide. In short, it seems Trump is making foreign liberals great again. But we can say that about other things, too, including domestic affairs."

According to Blake, Trump's "brazen second-term actions appear to be pushing Americans in the opposite direction" when it comes to "free trade, immigration, Ukraine and checks and balances."

Meanwhile, in The Hill, Schoen and Cooperman emphasize that Trump's weak approval ratings show that "Americans are increasingly concerned with Trump's constitutional overreach" and the "economic chaos he's unleashed."

"Indeed, Trump's overall approval rating has seen a 14-point decline since entering office," according to Schoen and Cooperman. "He is now 7 points underwater (45 percent approve versus 52 percent disapprove) after starting with a plus-7 point rating per RealClearPolitics polling aggregator. That being said, Trump's numbers may actually be worse than the aggregator makes them appear."

Schoen and Cooperman continue, "In the five most recent polls tracked by Real Clear Politics — NPR (-10), ABC News (-13), CNN (-14), NY Times/Siena (-12) and CBS (-10) — Trump has an average negative 12-point approval rating. Put another way, Trump has blown all of the goodwill he had during his honeymoon period as sentiments have turned decidedly negative."

Read Aaron Blake's full Washington Post column at this link (subscription required) and the Douglas E. Schoen Carly Cooperman op-ed for The Hill here.

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