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A TURN FOR THE WORSE - It’s not just about the price of eggs.
As food prices for Americans continue to rise, including a dozen eggs that cost $8.99 on a recent trip to Vons in L.A., President Trump and his billionaire consort in hate-mongering, Elon Musk, are focused elsewhere. Their daily attacks on public servants and essential services and attempts at commandeering Americans’ sensitive tax and Social Security data are triggering a groundswell of concern and revulsion among voters.
New survey data from reputable, independent national pollsters and fact-based news outlets CNN, Gallup, Reuters, and Ipsos/Washington Post show support for Trump nosediving over the past 4 weeks.
Trump is now in negative territory with Americans, meaning more voters currently express opposition to him than support. His negative rating is -5 in the CNN poll, -6 in the new Gallup poll, -7 in the Reuters poll, and -8 in the Ipsos/Wash. Post poll.
Solid majorities of the American people are now against Trump — 51 percent in both the Gallup and Reuters polls — and his sidekick in assailing the federal workforce, billionaire Elon Musk.
In the CNN survey, 54 percent of respondents called “Musk’s prominent role in the Trump Administration” a “bad thing”; only 28 percent said it was a “good thing.” That is a stark 2-to-1 disparity of disapproval.
This surging disapproval of Trump and Musk comes with other shiny nuggets of insight. By a 6-to-1 margin, Americans strongly oppose Trump’s blanket pardon of violent insurrectionists convicted of crimes, including mauling and assaulting police at the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021. The margin of voters rejecting Trump’s action to release these assailants is 83 percent to 14 percent.
In another flashing warning sign to Trump and Republicans along with many retail corporations like Target and educational institutions, Americans appear to embrace diversity, equity, and inclusion policies, NOT oppose them. By a 15-point margin, 53 percent to 38 percent, voters support organizations’ work to make their staff and leadership more welcoming and reflective of the nation’s pluralism.
On Friday, February 21, a federal judge in Baltimore put a nationwide stop on implementation or enforcement of a sweeping Trump executive order seeking to prohibit any program attributed to efforts for more inclusive and diverse workplaces. The ruling called the flimsy, scattershot rationalization by Trump’s new Justice Department for the order to be “arbitrary and discriminatory” and described its negative impacts as “pernicious.”
In a final dire harbinger for Trump, the raft of high-quality, independent polls showed Democrats rising to a 13-point advantage in the newest survey of the generic ballot. In essence, that reading shows which of the two major parties voters are inclined to choose in a Congressional contest if elections were held today.
The 54-41 edge for Democrats over Republicans spells danger for Trump and his partisans as they seek to defend seats in special elections for Congress later this spring. The rating also signals opportunities for Democratic candidates and campaigns at the local and state level in 2025 as well as for recruiting volunteers to show up and speak up at protests that Democrats organize or cosponsor against continued White House firings and interference that threaten earned benefits, healthcare, parks, air-passenger safety, and military readiness. Turns out there is renewed kick in Democrats’ appeal, fueled by voters’ renewed antipathy to Trumpism.
(Hans Johnson is a longtime leader for LGBTQ+ human rights, environmental justice, and public education. His columns appear in national news outlets including USA Today and in top daily news outlets of more than 20 states. A resident of Eagle Rock, he is also president of East Area Progressive Democrats (EAPD), the largest grassroots Democratic club in California, with more than 1,100 members.)
