Confidence in Trump’s handling of the U.S. economy plummets, new polls show – CNBC
2025-04-23T21:55:12Z
Americans’ views of President Donald Trump’s ability to handle the economy gave him an edge during the 2024 presidential election.
US President Donald Trump speaks with reporters outside the White House in Washington, DC, on April 23, 2025.
Americans’ confidence in President Donald Trump’s ability to manage the U.S. economy has plummeted since he regained the White House, new polls reveal.
Just 37% of Americans approve of Trump’s handling of the economy, according to a Reuters/Ipsos survey released Wednesday, a rating lower than at any point during his first term.
A Pew Research Center survey also out Wednesday found that less than half of U.S. adults, 45%, have confidence in Trump’s ability to make “good decisions” about the economy.
This represents a 14 point drop from the same poll in November of last year, when 59% of respondents said they had confidence in Trump’s economic decision making,
The pair of surveys out Wednesday follow a CNBC All-America Economic Survey released earlier this week that also registered Trump’s lowest economic approval ratings of his entire White House career, with just 43% of Americans approving of his handling of the economy.
The plunge in Americans’ overall confidence in the president’s handling of the economy is especially significant given that Trump won the 2024 presidential election against then-Vice President Kamala Harris on a platform of lowering inflation and revitalizing an economy still recovering from Covid.
But since he took office, Trump has focused largely on imposing, then pausing, then imposing tariffs, as opposed to his promised tax cuts and deregulation.
The start-stop tariffs have created uncertainty and sent the stock market into turmoil on concerns over potential fallout from a trade war.
About 59% of Americans disapprove of Trump’s sweeping tariffs on imported goods, the Pew Research Center survey found.
There is still a partisan split in Americans’ confidence in Trump’s handling of the economy. Most Republicans, 80%, told the Pew poll they were ‘very’ or ‘somewhat confident’ in Trump’s ability to make good decisions about economic and tax policy. That compares to just 11% of Democrats who said the same.
As public confidence in Trump’s economic plan falters, his overall approval ratings have also slipped.
Approximately 42% of Americans approve of Trump’s job performance, according to the Reuters/Ipsos poll conducted April 16-21. That’s down from 47% during the days surrounding his inauguration.
Several other polls out this week found similar drops in Trump’s overall public approval: 44% of Americans approve of Trump’s handling of the presidency in the CNBC survey, as do 40% of respondents in the Pew survey. That 40% approval reflects a 7-point drop from February.
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