Tracking Trump - The President's approval for August 18th:
Bottom Line: This is one of two weekly tracking stories to get a reality/temperature check with regard to what's really going on with public opinion of the President. In this series we'll track the high point, low point and current ratings and week over week comparisons.
Trump's current ratings: 36.8% approval and 58.6% disapprove: -21.8% (8/4/17)
Trump highest approval ratings were an average 45.2% approval and 43% disapproval +2.2% (1/27/17)
Trump's current ratings: 39% approval and 55% disapprove: -16%
Now get ready for this one because based on the news cycle this week it's going to sound highly unlikely...While clearly still weak, President Trump's net approval rating is actually 5.8% higher than it was two weeks ago today (at my last update). While not all of this polling has completely factored in all of the potential fallout from the President's Tuesday press conference, much of the cycle is accounted for in these numbers. Here's a breakdown:
Seven accredited pollsters this week
85%+ of the polling was post Charlottesville
Just over 25% was after Tuesday's press conference
So, do with that what you will. There can come a point in which the media and political adversaries of the President could overplay their hand. The facts remain the facts. Nothing the President stated on Tuesday was factually incorrect. He did open the door to legitimate criticism by attempting to assert that there were good people potentially protesting alongside the white supremacists. It's too early to draw any real conclusions from these numbers but I'm sure that it'll come as a surprise to most that the President's net approval rating is nearly 6% improved from this time two weeks ago.
The range was Monmouth -7% to Reuters/Ipsos -23%
Until next week...