President Trump had a good poll on Monday: In a USA Today/Suffolk University survey, he leads all his potential Democratic rivals, including former Vice President Joe Biden by 3 percentage points, just inside the poll's ±3 point margin of error. But that's not the poll Trump highlighted on Twitter Monday afternoon — in fact, it's not quite clear what poll he was tweeting about that has his approval rating at 51 percent, or even above 50 percent. Biden either found that elusive poll or just decided he might just as well make up a number, too.
Biden does lead Trump by 7 points in a new Fox News poll, but Trump's overall approval rating in that survey is 45 percent, with 53 percent disapproving of his job performance. In the RealClearPolitics average of polls, Biden leads Trump by 6.2 percentage points and Trump's average approval rating is 44 percent, 8.8 points underwater.
In any case, point made, point won. The USA Today/Suffolk poll surveyed 1,000 registered voters Dec. 10-14.
The Week
Escape your echo chamber. Get the facts behind the news, plus analysis from multiple perspectives.
Sign up for The Week's Free Newsletters
From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.
From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.
-
Should Labour break manifesto pledge and raise taxes?Today's Big Question There are ‘powerful’ fiscal arguments for an income tax rise but it could mean ‘game over’ for the government
-
Nigerian Modernism: an ‘entrancing, enlightening exhibition’The Week Recommends Tate Modern’s ‘revelatory’ show includes 250 works examining Nigerian art pre- and post independence
-
To the point: the gender divide over exclamation marksTalking Point 'Men harbouring urges to be more exclamative' can finally take a breath – this is what using the punctuation really conveys
-
Senate votes to kill Trump’s Brazil tariffSpeed Read Five Senate Republicans joined the Democrats in rebuking Trump’s import tax
-
Border Patrol gets scrutiny in court, gains power in ICESpeed Read Half of the new ICE directors are reportedly from DHS’s more aggressive Customs and Border Protection branch
-
Shutdown stalemate nears key pain pointsSpeed Read A federal employee union called for the Democrats to to stand down four weeks into the government standoff
-
Trump vows new tariffs on Canada over Reagan adspeed read The ad that offended the president has Ronald Reagan explaining why import taxes hurt the economy
-
NY attorney general asks public for ICE raid footageSpeed Read Rep. Dan Goldman claims ICE wrongly detained four US citizens in the Canal Street raid and held them for a whole day without charges
-
Trump’s huge ballroom to replace razed East WingSpeed Read The White House’s east wing is being torn down amid ballroom construction
-
Trump expands boat strikes to Pacific, killing 5 moreSpeed Read The US military destroyed two more alleged drug smuggling boats in international waters
-
Trump demands millions from his administrationSpeed Read The president has requested $230 million in compensation from the Justice Department for previous federal investigations
