A new round of polls is being used to claim that Donald Trump is more unpopular today than he was right after January 6 — and the media is weaponizing those numbers to shape a story about his presidency, not to report yours.
What New Polls Are Claiming About Trump’s Disapproval
Recent national surveys, heavily promoted by left-leaning outlets, report Donald Trump’s job approval in the mid-30s, with disapproval around the low 60s, and describe this as matching or surpassing levels seen after the January 6 Capitol riot.[1][5] One widely cited cable poll found Trump’s approval at 37% and disapproval at 63%, nearly identical to his post-riot lows, and emphasized that roughly seven in ten Americans believe the country is headed in the wrong direction.[1] Coverage links this pessimism to economic anxiety, cost-of-living pressures, and concerns about democracy under Trump’s leadership, drawing a direct line from inflation and global instability to frustrations with the administration.
The polling storyline echoes 2021, when Pew Research Center recorded Trump’s lowest job approval of his first term at 29% in early January after the riot, a nine-point drop from August among the same respondents.[2][1] Pew’s panel data showed that about one quarter of those who approved in August switched to disapproval by January, confirming that previous sharp drops were genuine movement, not just polling noise.[2] Today’s narrative leans on that precedent to argue that current declines are similarly “real” and that public opinion has once again turned decisively against Trump, especially on his post-election conduct and broader political role.[2]
How Long-Term Data Show Polarization, Not Collapse
Historical polling from Gallup and other trackers paints a more complicated picture than the latest dramatic headlines suggest.[4][5] Across his first term, Trump’s average approval rating was 41%, the lowest for any president since Gallup began modern measurement, but it also never fell below the mid-30s for long and never rose above the high 40s, demonstrating unusually stable, deeply polarized support.[4] Gallup reports that even in his second administration, his highest approval was about 47% at the 2025 inauguration, with subsequent surveys drifting downward but still reflecting a country divided along hardened party lines rather than experiencing a brand-new collapse.[4][5]
Aggregated polling summaries for Trump’s current term show approval hovering in the high 30s and disapproval around 58–59% among all adults, very similar to earlier years of his political career.[4][5] These averages confirm that a majority of Americans tell pollsters they disapprove of Trump’s job performance, but they also show that this majority is neither new nor uniquely “post–January 6.”[4] Conservative voters remain remarkably loyal: retrospective polling found Trump at 91% approval among Republicans, even while his overall retrospective rating sat in the mid-40s, second-lowest only to Richard Nixon among recent presidents.[4] That pattern supports the idea that what polls really capture is not a sudden desertion of Trump’s base, but an entrenched partisan split amplified by hostile media framing.
Why the January 6 Comparison Is Being Revived Now
Media outlets and partisan commentators are reviving January 6 comparisons because they provide a powerful emotional frame rather than a neutral benchmark.[1][2][4] By tying today’s disapproval levels to the immediate aftermath of the riot, coverage invites viewers to interpret current frustrations over inflation, energy prices, and foreign crises as moral condemnation of Trump himself.[1][2] Headlines compress different types of polls — from all-adult national samples to likely-voter surveys — into a single dramatic story of “record unpopularity,” even though the underlying data show familiar ranges and long-standing polarization.[4][5]
Trump = Epic Failure
😆 🤣 😂 😹 😆 🤣
Trump's approval rating
5/25/26 36.6% w
disapproval 60.0% net negative of 23 points.declining Republican supportkey drivers of the drophttps://t.co/KJaV8Eccpe
— Give Me the Nobel ✌️Prize or I'll Destroy you! (@Impeach47N0W) May 25, 2026
Neutral polling analysis notes a recurring pattern: when a president faces economic or foreign-policy stress, a few bad surveys are quickly turned into sweeping claims that approval is “collapsing,” while skeptics argue that methodology, weighting, and timing can exaggerate swings.[1][4] In Trump’s case, credible evidence from Pew’s 2021 panel work demonstrates that large declines can be real, but current second-term numbers fall within his established historical band rather than breaking completely new ground.[1][2][4] For conservative readers, the key is to recognize how selective comparisons, especially to January 6, are being used to question Trump’s legitimacy and momentum, even as his core supporters remain steadfast and his agenda continues challenging the very establishment driving those narratives.
Sources:
[1] Web – How we know sharp decline in Trump approval was real shift in …
[2] YouTube – President Trump’s approval rating hits new low, poll finds
[4] Web – Presidential Approval Ratings — Donald Trump – Gallup News
[5] Web – Opinion polling on the second Trump presidency – Wikipedia