GALLUP : Obama Job Approval Rating Down to 38% Among Independents

Gallup ^ | 07/07/2010 | Jeffrey Jones

[SeekAndFind]

Overall job ratings for the president continue to be below majority level.

PRINCETON, NJ -- Thirty-eight percent of independents approve of the job Barack Obama is doing as president, the first time independent approval of Obama has dropped below 40% in a Gallup Daily tracking weekly aggregate. Meanwhile, Obama maintains the support of 81% of Democrats, and his job approval among Republicans remains low, at 12%.

These data are based on Gallup Daily tracking interviews conducted the week of June 28-July 4.

Over the past year, Obama has lost support among all party groups, though the decline has been steeper among independents than among Republicans or Democrats. Today's 38% approval rating among independents is 18 percentage points lower than the 56% found July 6-12, 2009. During the same period, his support has fallen nine points among Democrats (from 90% to 81%) and eight points among Republicans (from 20% to 12%).

Overall, 46% of Americans approve of the job Obama is doing as president in the June 28-July 4 aggregate, one point above his lowest weekly average. Obama's average weekly job approval rating has not been above 50% since Feb. 8-14, though it reached the 50% mark as recently as May 3-9.

[nascarnation]

I agree Obama will get a lot less votes in 2012 (assuming he’s on the ballot) than he did in 2008.
But in a 3-way election scenario, he’s still got a reasonable shot at winning because the support from his “base” is rock solid.

As for the “alternative” voice to the establishment media, how did they do vis a vis Baraq in 2008?

[massmike]

95% of blacks would love him no matter what he did

It would be easier to convince them that OJ really WAS the killer!

[wideawake]

Only Palin could do it if she went independent.

Regardless of one's opinion of Sarah Palin, she is not an egomaniac of the Wallace or Perot variety. She wouldn't do it.

[The Pack Knight]

Reasonable shot? I’d say more like a lock. If there is a significant third party candidate in 2012, then Obama will certainly be re-elected - potentially by a landslide in terms of electoral votes.

If it’s a Tea Party candidate who can split the Republican and right-leaning Independent votes, then we might see states like South Carolina and Texas in the blue column next time. That’s the nature of plurality, winner-take-all elections.

[SmokingJoe]

Where are you getting that 70%+ number?

USA Today/Gallup 1/9-11/09 - 83%
http://www.pollster.com/blogs/2009_01_09%20Topline.pdf

CNN 1/12-15/09 - 84%
http://www.cnn.com/2008/POLITICS/12/24/obama.approval/index.html

Post/Post 1/13-16/09 - 80%
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/politics/documents/postpoll011709.html

[henkster]

I think he’ll get on all the ballots. He’ll wave that bogus Hawaii paper around like Neville Chamberlain and they will let him on the ballot. 0bama will be “grandfathered” on those laws for all practical purposes. That’s just the way things are done now.

[SmokingJoe]

ABC/Post 1/13-16/09 - 80%
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/politics/documents/postpoll011709.html

[Eva]

Using the three sample groups, the average approval is 43.6%. Which means, the polls is weighted in the Dems favor.

I was wondering about that, it just didn't seem to add up. They must be using the same numbers from before the election. Maybe we should use the weighting of conservative, liberal and moderate. ....or maybe weighting is impossible to do accurately at this point.

[Maverick68]

I’d settle for an honest one...

[Soothesayer9]

And it "burns, burns, burns", into the fire..

[MississippiMan]

Imagine if he had a hostile media?

Forget hostile. Imagine if he had an honest media. Of course, if that were the case he would never have come remotely close to winning the presidency.

MM (in TX)

[caseinpoint]

Good points about Obama’s past political experience. We are seeing his stumbling methods of dealing with opposition in several ways. There are the regulatory takeovers, the unread bills shoved through Congress, the recess appointments, the two-question “press conferences”, the closed “townhall meetings”, the faux debates like the healthcare debate, and the show trial hearings where industry “criminals” were frogmarched in front of the cameras, the executive orders, and his proxy thugs threatening recalcitrant members of his own party. He definitely doesn’t know how to deal with anyone who disagrees with him.

[austinaero]

Wow, his approval has fallen more among the democrats than the republicans? The difference is statistically in the noise but still interesting.

[BenKenobi]

Which is about where Rsmussen has his support. Funny eh? Oversampling Dims is a good way to bump up poll numbers.

[fwdude]

You have to have a brain to have it damaged.

[GonzoGOP]

In fact, absent a well-known candidate (like Perot, Anderson, LaFollette and Roosevelt) no third party ever gets much more than 2% of the vote.

I'm not sure who the celebrity third party candidate who will siphon GOP votes could be at this point.

If he doesn't get the nomination outright (in my opinion doubtful) my bet would be Romney. Heaven knows he wants to be president. If Palin or some other conservative gets the nod I wouldn't be surprised if he does a Charlie Crist and runs as an independent. Romney certainly has the money and ego to make a third party bid. And his party loyalty has always been suspect. He has a fanatical fan base especially in places like FR that will effectively disrupt any chance for conservatives to rally around the actual GOP nominee.

Finally, and most importantly like Crist he would be able to convince himself that he has a serious chance of winning a three way. With Obama stuck in the high 30s all he has to do is unleash the flying monkeys on the Conservative (and the MSM will surely help in that) to get to 40% for the win.

[OCCASparky]

And yet his overall is still, according to Gallup, at 46 percent? Nah, no oversampling of Democrats here, no siree!!!

[skr]

We need smarter independents.

[Ham Hock]

I’m a little confused when they refer to independents. It would seem to me they are referring to people who are actually registered as “unaffiliated” (not registered with any party) rather than those registered with the independent party.

Am I missing something?

[Ham Hock]

I’m a little confused when they refer to independents. It would seem to me they are referring to people who are actually registered as “unaffiliated” (not registered with any party) rather than those registered with the independent party.

Am I missing something?