Zogby: Obama's Approval Sinking

A new IBOPE Zogby Interactive poll shows President Barack Obama's approval rating at 42 percent, the lowest since December, when it hit 39 percent.

The poll also finds likely voters split over whether or not a government shutdown would be harmful to the economic recovery. Forty-nine percent say they agree a government shutdown would hurt the recovery, 45 percent say they disagree and 6 percent are not sure.

When it comes to the three agree-disagree questions, responses of Republicans and Democrats are sharply divergent. Republicans are more likely than Democrats to agree military spending should be exempt from cuts and disagree that tax cuts on the wealthy should not continue and that a shutdown would harm the economy.

The poll also finds a seven-point bump from April 4 on approval of Republicans in Congress, from 34 percent to 41 percent. Approval of the Congressional GOP by Republican voters moved from 61 percent April 4 to 71 percent now. Among independent voters, approval of Congressional Republicans went from 26 percent to 32 percent.

Job approval for all of Congress is up two points from April 4; now at 24 percent. Approval of Congressional Democrats dropped one point to 31 percent. The percentage saying the nation is headed in the right direction fell three points to 26 percent.

The interactive poll of 2,109 likely voters has a margin of error of +/-2.2 percent. A sampling of IBOPE Zogby International's online panel, which is representative of the adult population of the U.S., was invited to participate. Slight weights were added to region, party, age, race, religion, gender and education to more accurately reflect the population.