As the U.S. coronavirus death toll mounts, President Donald Trump’s approval ratings are falling.
Toward the end of March, when the death toll was relatively small, Trump’s favorability ratings inched closer to a split, with 50.2% disapproving of his presidency and 46.3% approving, according to a compilation of recent polls by the fivethirtyeight.com website.
But since then, the gap in his approval ratings has widened, as news of the pandemic has consumed the country and Trump has held almost daily press conferences about efforts to combat it. The U.S. death toll has now topped 47,000.
At the moment, 52.5% disapprove of his presidency and 43.5% approve, according to the fivethirtyeight site.
Over the past nine days, a list shows Trump with negative ratings in 24 of 25 polls, with one tied at 50-50 on the approval-disapproval assessment.
Another website, realclearpolitics.com, showed better results for Trump than fivethirtyeight, with an average of polls showing a 51.5% disapproval standing compared with 46% approval.
Its list of 10 polls this month showed Trump in negative territory in eight of them, with two tied.
More specifically, 50.1% of those polled viewed his handling of the coronavirus negatively, with 47.3% approving.
Looking to next November’s presidential election, most U.S. polls show Trump trailing former Vice President Joe Biden, who has defeated two dozen other Democratic candidates for the right to face Trump.
Biden led Trump nationally by 6 or 7 percentage points in three polls this week.
