AP FACT CHECK: Trump overstates his job performance ratings
WASHINGTON (AP) — President Donald Trump isn’t getting his facts straight when citing his overall job approval ratings.
In a tweet, Trump boasts of poll numbers that show 52 percent of all Americans approved of his performance in office, in spite of the “fake news media.”
No known poll exists showing such high ratings.
A look at the claim:
TRUMP: “Over 90% approval rating for your all time favorite (I hope) President within the Republican Party and 52% overall. This despite all of the made up stories by the Fake News Media trying endlessly to make me look as bad and evil as possible. Look at the real villains please!” — tweet Sunday.
THE FACTS: He’s wrong in regard to polls citing his overall job ratings.
The Associated Press couldn’t find any evidence of a recent poll that put Trump’s approval at 52 percent, and the White House and his re-election campaign didn’t immediately respond to requests for specifics.
Polls are a snapshot of public opinion at the moment they are taken, and job approval can — and has in recent history — vary during a president’s term. George W. Bush, for example, had approval ratings that reached into the high 80s and low 90s in the wake of the Sept. 11 attacks, and dropped into the high 20s and low 30s toward the end of his time in office.
Since his inauguration, however, Trump’s job approval has been remarkably consistent — in the high 30s and low 40s — in polls from various media organizations and other pollsters.
The latest AP-NORC poll, taken this month, finds Trump’s approval among American adults at 38 percent. Some other recent polls measure his approval in the low to mid-40s.
On his level of support among Republicans, Trump is correct that they broadly approve of his work as president. In the same AP-NORC poll that found 38 percent of adults approving of the president, 76 percent of Republicans and those who lean toward the GOP said they approved of Trump.
That fits with the pattern of his presidency, in which Trump has generally had widespread support from Republicans. Some polls have put that level of support as high as 90 percent.
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Associated Press writer Hannah Fingerhut contributed to this report.
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