(Daily Caller News Foundation) — More voters now believe that former President Donald Trump performed well while in office than in previous years, according to a new poll by NBC News.
Trump is the leading candidate for the Republican presidential nomination in 2024 and, should he win the nomination, is expected to challenge President Joe Biden, the leading Democratic candidate, in the general election in November. Presently, 40% of respondent voters believe that Trump performed “better than expected,” an increase of 11% from the last iteration of the poll in 2018, NBC reported.
Among respondents, 29% of voters believe that Trump’s presidency was worse than expected, with 31% indicating it was as they expected, NBC reported. In 2018, 27% of voters believed that Trump’s presidency was going worse than expected, though 43% believed that his presidency was going as they expected.
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) January 8, 2021
In contrast, only 14% of voters believe that Biden has outperformed their expectations, while 42% believe that he has done a worse job than they expected, with 44% indicating that he has performed as expected, according to the poll.
When comparing Biden and Trump’s ratings, the latter’s record is viewed more favorably by independent voters. Whereas 38% of such voters believe that Trump performed better than expected, just 6% of voters believe that Biden has beat expectations, while 52% think he’s underperformed, compared to 18% for Trump.
“The economy is stagnant as [far as] I’m concerned. I don’t see it getting better or worse, but I do not see anything that will improve it,” said an independent woman respondent from New York who voted for Biden in the 2020 presidential election to NBC. “In 2020, he ran on bringing us together, and instead he made us further away.”
“Nothing has touched me when it comes to Biden at all,” said Dianne Holt, another woman from New Jersey who voted for Biden in 2020. However, she cautioned that her impression of Trump hasn’t changed, due to his efforts to overturn the results of that year’s election.
“He just isn’t good for the country,” Holt said. “You cross a line that you can’t come back from, regardless.”
The poll was conducted between Jan. 26 and Jan. 30, 2024, and surveyed 1,000 respondents who are registered to vote. The margin of error is ± 3.1 percentage points.
The Biden and Trump campaigns did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
