Nearly 30 percent of Republicans don't trust what Trump says about COVID-19, poll finds

Americans disapprove of President Trump's response to the COVID-19 pandemic by a margin of 60 percent to 38 percent in a Washington Post/ABC News poll released Friday morning. And that's bad news for the president, because 63 percent of U.S. adults say it's more important to control the outbreak, even if it hurts the economy, versus 33 percent who say it's more important to restart the economy. In May, 46 percent of Americans said they approved of Trump's coronavirus response; in late March it was 51 percent.

Americans not only disagree with Trump's pandemic response and priorities, they also don't trust the information he shares about the outbreak. Only 34 percent of U.S. adults said they have a good or great deal of trust in Trump's COVID-19 information, while 64 percent said they don't trust him much or at all — and that includes 46 percent who don't trust his information even a bit. Broken down by party, 6 percent of Democrats, 30 percent of independents, and 71 percent of Republicans say they trust Trump's coronavirus information, meaning 29 percent of the people in his own party don't find him a credible source on the most important issue of the day.

Support for Trump's handling of the coronavirus outbreak has dropped across the board since May, but the slippage was particularly steep among white evangelical Christians (16 percentage points drop), white men without college degrees (15 point fall), and residents of rural areas (11 point slip), the poll found. Since March, Trump's support on coronavirus has dropped 23 points in rural areas and 16 points in the suburbs.

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The Washington Post/ABC poll was conducted July 12-15 by Langer Research, contacting 1,006 U.S. adults on cellphone or landline. The overall margin of sampling error is ± 3.5 percentage points.

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Peter has worked as a news and culture writer and editor at The Week since the site's launch in 2008. He covers politics, world affairs, religion and cultural currents. His journalism career began as a copy editor at a financial newswire and has included editorial positions at The New York Times Magazine, Facts on File, and Oregon State University.