Is Trump's Approval Dropping?

Presidential honeymoons aren't what they used to be, but in recent U.S. history, the chief executive’s highest approval ratings have been close to the time of their inauguration. Based on the latest slate of polls, Donald Trump’s approval seems to be following a similar downward trend from  his inauguration, albeit at a faster pace.

The good news for Republicans , however, is that Trump is more than holding his own among younger demographics.

In the current RealClearPolitics Average of Polls for President Trump’s Job Approval, polls have Trump’s approval between +9 in a Harvard-Harris poll and -6 in an NPR/PBS/Marist and a Reuters/Ipsos poll. In the average on Monday, Trump’s net job approval stands at +0.6, with 48.4% approval and 47.8% disapproval.

In the first few days of his presidency, the RCP Average clocked his approval at +8.5 points. A large part of this was a snap poll on Jan. 20, the first day of his administration, from Insider Advantage, which had his approval at +17 points.

Approval Among Young People

In the analysis of the InsiderAdvantage poll, Matt Towery of Insider Advantage noted that the president was doing well among young people, boosting his popularity: “Trump’s decision to spare TikTok caused his support among younger voters to soar to that same fifty-six percent approval number. It is rare to ever see a Republican president do so well with the youngest segment of voters.”

A recent poll from Rasmussen Reports taken with 2,033 likely voters found that Trump’s approval was at 50% generally but at 60% among 18- to 39-year-olds. For 40- to 64-year-olds, it was only 46%, and among those 65 and older, it was 45%.

Although this trend doesn’t hold in all polls, some did show similar results. The youngest voters, 18- to 29-year-olds, approved of Trump’s job performance more than 30- to 39-year-old millennials, although most other polls showed those 65 and older as more approving of Trump than younger age groups.

Trump Approval on the Economy

One of the major drags on Joe Biden’s approval rating was inflation. In summer 2022, when inflation was at its peak of 9%, Biden’s approval fell to its lowest point, putting him under water by nearly 20 percentage  points.

So far, inflation doesn’t appear to be hurting Trump too much. Last week, Personal Consumption Expenditures, the measure of inflation most used by the Federal Reserve, showed inflation was up 2.5% from January 2024 to January 2025. This is only 0.5% above the Federal Reserve’s target inflation rate.

However, perhaps a bigger concern for the first year of Trump’s term will be GDP growth. On Monday, the Federal Reserve Bank of Atlanta revised its estimate of GDP growth in the first quarter of 2025 down to -2.8% annualized. While this is only a forecast and subject to revision as more data comes out – and the official numbers won’t be released until April 30 by the Bureau of Economic Analysis – such negative numbers could prove troublesome for the Federal Reserve and the Trump administration if they continue.

Currently, Trump’s approval fares well on the economy. On the issue of “jobs and the economy,” in the latest Economist/YouGov poll, he had a +2 net approval. Although only 19% of Americans say the economic trend is “getting better,” compared to 43% who said it is “getting worse.” When asked about their personal situation, 35% of respondents said they think they will be better off financially in a year, while only 26% said they think they will be worse off.