Trump approval rating appears to be underwater one month into second term: Survey

(The Hill) -- President Donald Trump’s approval rating appears to be underwater as many suggest he may be overstepping his authority, according to a new survey.

The CNN poll, released Thursday and conducted by SSRS, shows that while 47 percent of adults in the U.S. say they approve of Trump's moves since returning to the Oval Office a month ago, 52 percent say the opposite.

The majority of respondents, 75 percent, said they believe he has handled the presidency in a way that they expected. The remaining 25 percent said Trump has steered the position in an unexpected way, according to the survey.

Broken down, more than 4 in 10 — roughly 41 percent — said he's handled his second term as expected, calling it a "good thing." While another 33 percent said he's in line with expectations but feel it is a "bad thing," the poll shows.

Immigration reform, which Trump leaned into heavily during his time on the campaign trail, is at the top of the list of issues respondents said Trump was tackling — with 28 percent naming it as the most significant. The president has promised the largest deportation of illegal immigrants in history.

In second place, bringing in roughly 12 percent, was tech billionaire Elon Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) tapping into agency databases across the government. DOGE’s work in reducing the federal workforce and cutting spending came next with 10 percent.

Over half of the respondents, 55 percent, say Trump has not paid attention to the country’s most important problems. The other 45 percent hold the opposite view, according to the poll. 

Another 54 percent said they either feel pessimistic or afraid as they look ahead to the remainder of Trump’s second term. The remaining 46 percent argued they feel enthusiastic and optimistic, per the data.

Another poll from Reuters/Ipsos published Wednesday showed that the president’s approval rating, 44 percent, was slipping amid his recent moves to impose tariffs on the U.S.’s main trading partners and signaling that more are on the way. Some 51 percent disapproved of his work so far, according to that survey.

At the end of January, Trump’s approval rating was at 49 percent, according to Emerson College Polling survey. His disapproval rating was 41 percent, while 10 percent were neutral. 

The latest CNN/SRSS poll was conducted from Feb. 13-17 among 1,206 adults. The margin of error was 3.1 percentage points.