American voters are not thrilled about President Donald Trump or his trade agenda overall.
A Quinnipiac University national poll, released Tuesday of 1,078 voters surveyed between May 16 and May 20, found that just 39% approve of the president’s handling of trade, while 53% disapprove. The poll carries a margin of error of plus or minus 3.7%.
Trump reportedly doesn’t fare much better on the trade issue in key industrial states — which had carried him to victory in 2016 and are crucial for his 2020 re-election bid, but whose farmers have been hit hardest by the ongoing trade war.
Voters’ downward thumbs on trade contrasts starkly with their views of the economy as a whole. A large majority of respondents, 71%, said that the economy is in either "excellent" or "good" standing — a figure Quinnipiac says is the highest total for those categories in nearly 18 years.
But the high marks for the economy don’t appear to be lifting Trump’s approval ratings. The president had 38% approval in the Quinnipiac poll, and 57% disapproval. That’s a wider gap in approval than Trump scored in the last Quinnipiac survey in early May.
Yet voters are increasingly unimpressed with Trump’s handling of trade, as well as on China, the main adversary in his trade war.
