Drops in Approval & Trust on the Economy End Obama’s Post-Election Honeymoon
The post-election party is over for Barack Obama, with the president slipping in overall approval and relinquishing his advantage over congressional Republicans in trust to handle the economy. But it looks not so much like a gain for the GOP as a sequester-inspired pox on both houses.
The automatic budget cuts now in effect are unpopular, if not overwhelmingly so – Americans in the latest ABC News/Washington Post poll disapprove by 53-39 percent. But concerns about their impact are broad, and, by a 14-point margin, more put responsibility on the Republicans in Congress than on Obama for the sequester taking place.
That said, it’s Obama’s economic stewardship that’s taken the bigger hit. Last December, still enjoying a post-election glow, he held an 18-point edge over the Republicans in Congress in trust to handle the economy. Today, with the latest budget impasse in full force, that’s now shrunk to an insignificant 4 percentage points.
The president’s job approval rating overall, meanwhile, has lost 5 points, from nearly a three year high of 55 percent in January to his more customary 50 percent. The Democrats in Congress have moved in the same direction, down 5 points in approval since December to 34 percent in this poll, produced for ABC by Langer Research Associates. ABC News platforms today will air an exclusive interview with the president by ABC’s George Stephanopoulos.
Approval of the Republicans in Congress is flat, but, at 24 percent, even lower than it is for the Democrats. And the Congress as a whole has a dismal 16 percent job approval rating, a mere three points from the record low in nearly 40 years of polling it set slightly more than a year ago.
http://www.langerresearch.com/uploads/1147a3Post-SequesterPolitics.pdf
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