As President Joe Biden's job approval hits a new low of 33% – 58% disapprove – in the latest The Washington Post/ABC News/Ipsos poll released Sunday, it is becoming more and more clear to voters former President Donald Trump is the choice to face him in November.
Trump, who never reached the lows of Biden's approval during his presidency by this pollster, dominates his GOP primary challengers with 72% of GOP-leaning U.S. adults who would be satisfied with Trump as the nominee. Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis is second at 61% who would be satisfied with him as the nominee.
A majority of GOP-leading adults would be not be satisfied with former South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley (just 48% satisfied), entrepreneur Vivek Ramaswamy (44%), or former Arkansas Gov. Asa Hutchinson (just 17%).
This comes as Biden's job approval is the lowest in 15 years –– only former President George W. Bush was worse –– and an alarming 71% majority checked the box for "the economy is in bad shape, given higher prices, and interest rates."
Trump leads his GOP primary rivals going into the Iowa caucus on each of the polled metrics:
- Best chance to win in November:
- Trump 68%
- Haley 12%
- DeSantis 11%
- Ramaswamy 2%
- Strongest leader:
- Trump 65%
- DeSantis 13%
- Haley 10%
- Ramaswamy 4%
- Most qualified to be president:
- Trump 54%
- DeSantis 18%
- Haley 14%
- Ramaswamy 5%
- Best represents your values:
- Trump 45%
- DeSantis 19%
- Haley 16%
- Ramaswamy 8%
- Best understands your problems:
- Trump 46%
- DeSantis 17%
- Haley 14%
- Ramaswamy 10%
That last metric has been a push by DeSantis in the final week. He said he is running on issues that matter to Iowans as Haley is running for her donor's issues and Trump is running for his legal issues.
"I am not running for my issues," DeSantis said in the final debate this week. "I am running for your issues.
"We need to make this election a referendum on the failures of Joe Biden, the failures of the Democratic Party and how we have the formula to engineer a great comeback for this country."
Ipsos Public Affairs conducted the polling for Langer Research Associates to be published by the Post and ABC News among 2,228 U.S. adults Jan. 4-8. The partisan-lean breakdown of the adults were 41% independent, 25% Democrats, and 25% Republicans. And the results have a margin of error of plus or minus 2.5 percentage points.
Eric Mack ✉
Eric Mack has been a writer and editor at Newsmax since 2016. He is a 1998 Syracuse University journalism graduate and a New York Press Association award-winning writer.
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