Polls

Trump Badly Losing His Fights With Media

| Tom Jensen

PPP’s newest national poll finds that Donald Trump is losing all of his fights with the media- and voters really think he needs to reduce his cable news consumption.

62% of voters nationally think Trump should keep his cable watching to less than an hour a day, and 82% think he needs to keep it under 2 hours a day. Just 6% of voters in the country think it’s a good idea for Trump to spend more than 2 hours a day watching cable news.

Last week Trump declared that the news media was the ‘enemy of the American people’ but we find that only 35% of voters believe that, to 53% who say that isn’t the case. By a 48/44 spread they say it is actually Trump who is the greater threat to the American people than the media. We asked voters who they thought had more credibility between Trump and each of the outlets he singled out for attack last week, and Trump loses out to every one of them by double digits:

Who do you think has more credibility: Donald Trump or…

Winner

New York Times

New York Times, 52/40

NBC

NBC, 51/40

CNN

CNN, 51/41

ABC

ABC, 51/41

CBS

CBS, 51/41

We also in general find that voters find the media outlets Trump considers hostile to him credible, while it finds the outlets more friendly to him less credible.

Outlet

Seen as Credible/Not Credible

Net Credibility

CBS

56/31

+25

ABC

56/34

+22

NBC

54/33

+21

New York Times

53/34

+19

CNN

52/37

+15

Fox News

46/40

+6

Daily Caller

6/37

-31

Info Wars

7/41

-34

Breitbart

12/48

-36

All 5 of the outlets Trump singled out for attack last week are seen as credible by majorities of the public. Out of the Trump friendly outlets only Fox News comes out seen as more credible than not, but it is still seen as less credible than all the mainstream outlets Trump targeted in his media attack tweet last week. Meanwhile Daily Caller, Info Wars, and Breitbart clearly still just appeal to fringes of the population even with Trump in the White House- even within his base only 6-20% of voters consider each of those sources to be credible.

Other notes from our newest poll on the Trump Presidency:

-For the first time ever in our polling we now find an outright majority of Americans in favor of the Affordable Care Act- 50% support it to only 38% who are opposed. Only 33% of voters think the best path forward on the ACA is outright repeal, while 61% think it should be kept with whatever needs to be fixed in it being fixed.

-By a 58/29 spread, voters want an independent investigation into Russia’s involvement in the 2016 election and its ties to Michael Flynn. Russia (12/61 favorability) and Vladimir Putin (8/73 favorability) continue to be extremely unpopular with Americans, and they want the government to get to the bottom of their interference in our affairs.

-Sweden was not the right foe for Donald Trump to pick a fight with. Sweden has a 58/9 favorability rating with Americans, compared to Donald Trump’s 44/52, and by a 48/38 spread voters say they have a higher opinion of Sweden than Trump.

-Members of Congress who dodge open town hall meetings may be opening themselves up to trouble with their constituents. 81% of voters think they ought to hold town halls, to only 5% who think their members of Congress should avoid them. That includes overwhelming majorities of Democrats (88/2), independents (81/2), and Republicans (73/11) who think members of Congress should make themselves available to the public in that way.

Mitch McConnell (25/45 approval) and Paul Ryan (37/43 approval) are both unpopular, and Democrats hold a 46/43 lead on the generic Congressional ballot.

-The basic transparency concerns voters have about Donald Trump aren’t going anywhere 5 weeks into his tenure as President. 61% of voters think he needs to release his tax returns, to only 33% who don’t think it’s necessary for him to. In fact by a 57/32 spread, voters would support a law requiring Presidential candidates to release 5 years of their tax returns to even appear on the ballot.  Concerns about Trump’s business conflicts remain as well- 62% think he needs to fully divest from his business interests, to only 29% who don’t think it’s necessary for him to.

-Trump comes in with a 45/48 approval spread this week, and with his favorability rating at 44/52. We’ve seen more fluctuation in his approval numbers since he took office than his favorability. Only 43% of voters agree with the claim Trump made last week that the White House is running well, to 51% who say it’s not. One reason for the perception that the White House is not running well may be the unpopularity of a lot of Trump’s most prominent aides. Steve Bannon (19/42 favorability), Kellyanne Conway (33/46 favorability), and Sean Spicer (32/37 favorability) are all seen in a negative light.

Trump’s campaign style rally in Florida last week did not come off well with voters- only 39% think he should continue to hold campaign rallies as President, to 51% who say he should not. Speaking of the campaign, despite Trump’s repeated claims of having won the most electoral votes since Ronald Reagan most voters aren’t buying that- only 19% think he had the biggest win since Reagan to 58% who say he didn’t. Trump’s voters do buy the lie though- 43% of them think he had the biggest win since Reagan to 28% who think he didn’t, and 29% who aren’t sure.

We find this week that support for impeaching Trump is at 41%, with 46% of voters opposed to impeachment. 70% of voters think it should be legal to protest Trump, to 21% who think protesting Trump should be illegal. Among Trump’s voters it’s closer with 51% thinking protesting the President should be legal to 38% who say they think it should be illegal.

-Finally Kyrie Irving is really off on his own with the ‘earth is flat’ thing.’ Only 1% of Americans believe that. It’s hard to find anything only 1% of Americans believe.

Full results here

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