Gallup Reveals Donald Trump Is The Most Unpopular Presidential Candidate In Poll’s History
In a piece published on Saturday, Gallup’s Frank Newport pointed out that Republican Presidential frontrunner and big fan of the Bible Donald Trump is the least popular major party Presidential candidate that the polling firm has ever tracked. Since 1992, when Gallup began surveying candidates favorability, no White House hopeful had ever broken the 60% unfavorable mark. That is, until this past week, when Trump hit the milestone.
Based on results from a two-week average through January 27th, 33% of all Americans hold a favorable view of The Donald while 60% see him in a negative light. This gives him a net unfavorable rating of -27, far higher than any other candidate running right now and beyond what we’ve seen in any election since 1992.
Democratic hopeful Hillary Clinton, who is just straight up hated by Republicans and conservatives, has a net negative of -10 (42% – 52%), as does former Florida Governor Jeb Bush (35% – 45%). No other candidate is above 38% unfavorable.
In historical perspective, candidates tend to see their negatives rise the closer the election gets, as voters’ partisanship starts to take over. Even then, the closest any other Dem or GOP candidate came to matching Trump’s current unfavorability was George H.W. Bush during the ’92 election. In October of that year, Bush’s negative rating reached 57%. (He lost that election to Bill Clinton.) Clinton wouldn’t rise above 49% that year, and stayed at or below 44% in 1996.
In the 2000 election, neither Al Gore or George W. Bush went above 42% negative prior to Election Day, though Gore did rise above that number during the contentious vote-counting process and Supreme Court decision in December. Bush ticked up to 47% during 2004 while his opponent John Kerry peaked at 45%. In 2008, both Barack Obama and John McCain were seen positively in most voters’ eyes, with Obama never going past 37% and McCain only briefly getting up to 44%.
Even in 2012, when Republicans had already made Obama a pejorative, the current POTUS didn’t see his unfavorable rating go above 48%. (Mitt Romney also peaked at 48%.) Newport even pointed out that Gallup had only seen one sitting President go past the 60% unfavorable threshold, and that was Dubya during his last year, when he got as high as 66%.
For those looking for a bright spot in the whole Rise of Trump, here you go. While Republican voters are increasingly embracing the celebrity billionaire’s xenophobic, racist, misogynistic, substance-free campaign, the vast majority of Americans really can’t stand the bastard. And it is really across the board, too. From a recent NBC poll, these five groups give Trump superhigh negative scores.
- Among African Americans: 9% positive, 81% negative (-72)
- Among Latinos: 22% positive, 69% negative (-47)
- Among women: 26% positive, 62% negative (-36)
- Among independents: 26% positive, 52% negative (-26)
- Among suburban voters: 31% positive, 55% negative (-24)
Considering the huge amount of media exposure he’s received, you’d be hard pressed to find anyone with no opinion of the guy. He can win over under-educated, low-information, bigoted white voters, but there are only so many of them to go around. Sure, that represents a large portion of the GOP’s homogeneous base, but it doesn’t reflect the country as a whole.
