Biden’s low approval ratings weigh on undecided voters

Among voters who only somewhat disapprove of Biden, 44% plan to vote for the Democrats in Congress in November. Thirty-five percent of them plan to vote Republican. And an additional 21% say they are still undecided — a larger block of undecided than there are in the two groups with stronger opinions about Biden’s job performance.

Congressional Democrats’ advantage among those voters in this week’s poll resulted in a slight Democratic improvement on the generic ballot: 47% of voters said they would support a Democratic candidate, while 42% said they would they would support a Republican. That’s compared to 45% for Democrats and 44% for Republicans in the previous POLITICO/Morning Consult poll.

The 5-point advantage for Democrats stands out from most public polls right now, with results ranging from a close midterm race to small GOP trails. But what’s consistent is that Biden’s approval rating stabilized in the 1940s — and voters who have a negative opinion of him, if not a strident opinion, represent the margin of victory or defeat. .

On the generic ballot, 92% of voters who “strongly approve” of Biden vote for Congressional Democrats, and those who “somewhat approve” of Biden are nearly as strong in their support for Democrats, with 82% support. Meanwhile, 85% of those who strongly disapprove of Biden say they will vote for the Republican candidate for Congress.

Voters who somewhat disapprove of Biden make up 15% of poll respondents, including equal shares of men and women. They include a good part – 13% – of Democrats, as well as 20% of independents and 13% of Republicans.

There were only slight differences in education and income levels among these voters. But people under 34 were more likely to fall into the « little disapprove » category. The same is true for voters who identified as “Other” or Hispanic, with about a quarter of each group saying they somewhat disapprove of Biden.

The POLITICO/Morning Consult poll was conducted Oct. 21-23, of 2,005 registered voters with a margin of error of plus or minus 2 percentage points.

The poll also found a majority of voters think former President Donald Trump should comply with a subpoena to testify and share documents with the congressional committee investigating the Jan. 6 attack. against the US Capitol. The subpoena was officially issued last week.

Sixty-six percent of voters said Trump should testify, with 48 percent saying « yes, definitely. » And 68% said he should share documents with the committee.

Support for complying with the congressional subpoena was bipartisan but had significantly more support from Democrats, 90% of whom said they believe Trump should testify before the committee. A majority of independent voters, 63%, and 42% of GOP voters also agreed.

In other bad news for Democrats, 68% of poll respondents said they believed the US economy was currently in a recession, compared to 19% who said they did not. The percentages were the same as last week’s POLITICO/Morning Consult poll.

A plurality of voters said they prioritize economic issues when deciding who they vote for, with 46% saying it is their main issue.

Voters give Biden lower ratings than Trump on immigration. Forty-nine percent of those polled said the US immigration system had gotten worse under Biden, including 16% of Democrats. Only 19% of voters said the immigration system was improving.

The poll found that 43% of voters thought the immigration system had improved under Trump, of which 80% were Republicans, 14% were Democrats and 36% were independents. Thirty-one percent said things were worse under Trump, including a majority of Democrats and just 8% of GOP voters.