Americans expect Obama to fare better in history than 6 of the last 11 presidents

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published 12 January 2017

He's no JFK, but Americans are pretty optimistic about how history will remember the presidency of Barack Obama. A Gallup survey asking how the past 11 presidents will go down in history found Americans think Obama is at least above average:

However, these evaluations can change over time. While some presidents (like Reagan and Clinton) maintain history ratings quite close to those they had at the end of their tenure, others have seen improvement (Carter and George W. Bush) or increasingly negative sentiments (George H.W. Bush); Carter and the Bushes have seen their ratings swing as much as 30 points, meaning Obama's assessment may yet evolve considerably.

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Bonnie Kristian was a deputy editor and acting editor-in-chief of TheWeek.com. She is a columnist at Christianity Today and author of Untrustworthy: The Knowledge Crisis Breaking Our Brains, Polluting Our Politics, and Corrupting Christian Community (forthcoming 2022) and A Flexible Faith: Rethinking What It Means to Follow Jesus Today (2018). Her writing has also appeared at Time Magazine, CNN, USA Today, Newsweek, the Los Angeles Times, and The American Conservative, among other outlets.

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