Survey of US Adults
The AP-NORC Center for Public Affairs poll asked respondents to say which president did more to help people like them, and asked them to rate the candidates on several different issues.
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The survey topics included: creating jobs, relations with other countries, climate change, health care costs, abortion laws, cost of living, election security, voting rights, and border security.
Most Don’t Benefit From Trump or Biden
The poll found that the public in general thinks both Joe Biden and Donald Trump’s presidencies did more harm than good.
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Only 35% of adults said Trump did more to help them, while 26% said Biden did more. A significant 30% portion said neither president was effective in helping them at all.
Demographic Breakdown
Hispanics, Women, Blacks, Muslims, and lower-income people were more likely to say Biden benefited them more than Trump did.
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Christians, Men, Whites, and higher-income people were more likely to say Trump benefited them over Biden. Jewish people tied between the two, with both Trump and Biden reaching 27% with this group.
Trump’s Weak Issues
This poll compared the results each candidate got on a range of different issues. Trump’s weakest issues appear to be voting rights, election security, abortion laws, and climate change.
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46% of respondents said Trump hurt voting rights, election security, and climate change while Biden’s numbers on these issues were in the 20-30% range. 47% said Trump hurt abortion laws, while only 32% said Biden did the same.
Biden’s Weak Issues
Biden’s weaknesses topped the poll with 58% of respondents saying he hurt the cost of living, compared to 40% who thought Trump had hurt it.
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56% of survey respondents said Biden had hurt immigration and border security. Only 37% of people in the poll said Trump had hurt these same issues.
Democrats Versus Republicans
Overall, the poll found that Democrats are more negative about Biden’s actions than Republicans are about Trump’s.
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Republicans are more unified about their opinions of Trump and few reported that Trump hurt any of these issues the poll asked about. Democrats were more likely to be critical of Biden in the survey.
Democrats Critical of Biden
Some Democrats are blaming Biden for the recent years of high inflation that has been hitting Americans hard in their pocketbooks.
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“Now that he’s in the office, the cost of living has spiked out of control, and there’s nothing being done about it,” Mornes, a Democrat, said, pointing to rising costs of rent and food. She said she believes Biden can do more, “He just chooses to do other things.”
Republicans on the Economy
Many Republicans feel that the economy was in better shape under Trump compared to how it is now.
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“Considering the price of gas, the price of groceries, the economy — I did very well during those four years,” Christina Elliott, 60, a Republican from Texas, said of the Trump presidency. “I didn’t have to worry about filling up my tank or losing half of my paycheck to the grocery store.”
Methodology
The methodology for the survey tried to build a representative sample of the U.S. household population.
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“Interviews for this survey were conducted between April 4 through April 8, 2024, with adults aged 18 and over representing the 50 states and the District of Columbia. Panel members were randomly drawn from AmeriSpeak, and 1,204 completed the survey—1,102 via the web and 102 by telephone,” said a methodology statement.
Margin for Error
According to APNORC, there was a slightly larger margin for error among Republican respondents.
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“The overall margin of sampling error is +/- 3.9 percentage points at the 95 percent confidence level…The margin of sampling error may be higher for subgroups. For example, the margin of sampling error is +/- 6.0 percentage points for Democrats and +/- 6.2 percentage points for Republicans,” the survey methodology said.
Election Months Away
The stage is being set with these issues as the general election in November gets continually closer. Many voters are starting to already make up their minds about who to vote for, leaving the candidates little time to sway a group from one side to the other.
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This poll grants a glimpse into the minds of voters who will go to the polls and select one of these men, who many think have both hurt America with their presidencies.