Americans Sour On Trump’s Handling Of The Economy, Poll Finds

Americans elected President Donald Trump in hopes that he would fight inflation and boost the U.S. economy, but as he approaches his 100th day in office, they are giving the Republican poor marks for his handling of both, a new Reuters/Ipsos poll shows, Jason Lange reported for Reuters.

Economic warning signs put pressure on Trump to reverse course on tariffs, but that even if Trump caved, the economy might not quickly bounce back amid the chaos. I Photo: The White House Facebook

Just 37% of respondents to the six-day poll that concluded approve of Trump’s handling of the economy, down from 42% in the hours after his January 20 inauguration, when he promised to supercharge the economy and bring about a "Golden Age of America."

The reading is lower than at any point in his first term, when it ranged from the mid-40s to mid-50s.

“You have a president who promised a golden age,” said James Pethokoukis, a senior fellow at the American Enterprise Institute, a conservative think tank. “But everything that’s supposed to be up is down, everything that’s supposed to be down is up.”

Pethokoukis said the economic warning signs put pressure on Trump to reverse course on tariffs, but that even if Trump caved, the economy might not quickly bounce back amid the chaos.

In a Reuters/Ipsos poll conducted just after Trump’s inauguration, some 55% of respondents said either inflation or the broader economy should be Trump’s main focus in his first 100 days in office, which run through April 30.

Twenty-three percent picked immigration.

Three months later, three-quarters of the respondents in the latest Reuters/Ipsos poll said they worried a recession was coming. Fifty-six percent of respondents, including one in four Republicans, said Trump’s moves to shake up the economy are “too erratic.”