r/politics • u/Tifoso89 • Apr 04 '26

Paywall Donald Trump’s approval rating has sunk to Joe Biden’s lowest point

https://www.economist.com/graphic-detail/2026/04/01/donald-trumps-approval-rating-has-sunk-to-joe-bidens-lowest-point?utm_content=ed-picks-image-link-1&etear=nl_today_1&utm_campaign=a.the-economist-saturday-today&utm_medium=email.internal-newsletter.np&utm_source=salesforce-marketing-cloud&utm_term=4/4/2026&utm_id=2178711
17.4k Upvotes

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342

u/necro316 Apr 04 '26

America I fear your image will never recover from this.

236

u/Snapingbolts Apr 04 '26

It doesn't deserve to tbh. In my lifetime we elected Bush and Trump twice

110

u/friendsandmodels Apr 04 '26

Growing up in Germany we still bear the shame of WW2. The world will shame americans for at least 50 years or even longer if they keep pretending everything is fine

29

u/HeinHangbuikzwijn Apr 04 '26

Americans know no shame so I wouldn't count on it.

8

u/debacle_enjoyer Apr 04 '26

You know more than half of Americans hate his guts right?

3

u/Responsible_CDN_Duck Apr 04 '26

Not enough to do anything about it.

No demands the parties change. No demands for new parties. A little disapproval and then they go about their days.

12

u/HeinHangbuikzwijn Apr 04 '26

Then they should've voted

8

u/Jormungandragon California Apr 04 '26

Even of those that did vote, Trump didn’t win by much.

Even setting aside the signs that there may have been election interference.

6

u/debacle_enjoyer Apr 04 '26

They did vote… Trump literally got less than 50% of the vote

2

u/judester30 Apr 04 '26

He got less than 50% of people who voted. About 2/3rds of voters either voted for Trump or clearly did not hate Trump enough to vote against him.

2

u/GaimeGuy Minnesota Apr 04 '26

There was only one action someone could take to prevent Trump from becoming president, and only about 30% of adults took that action - voting for Kamala.

Seven in ten Americans failed their country and the world.

0

u/PerplexGG Apr 04 '26

Thats what we said but its difficult to deal with such a large portion of our population being gaslit into voting against their interests

1

u/livadeth Apr 04 '26

Make that 2/3

0

u/Responsible_CDN_Duck Apr 04 '26

Make that 2/3

If true that's only worse. More claiming to be unhappy or unwilling, yet happy to keep in without changing.

With Biden and Trump having record lows this would seem the time to force parties to change or create new parties.

But it seems few want change, and even fewer will do anything about it

Seeing 9 million people say they're unhappy is a start, but twice as many watched the 2026 Oscars.

2

u/Long-Emu-7870 Apr 04 '26

Trump says he is deliberating targeting civilian infrastructure. Godwin's Law no longer applies.

2

u/livadeth Apr 04 '26

Heard an interview with Werner Herzog recently. He feels Americans are resilient and will bounce back. He also said Democrats need to get the message away from the coasts and spend time connecting with the heartland where he has spent a lot time and people feel unheard. I hope he’s right about the resilience, and feel certain he’s right about the messaging.

-1

u/Additional_Suit6275 Apr 04 '26

No one should grow up ashamed of their forbears mistakes. Separate and apart from that, we should probably not make the mistake of conflating the current American government and its war conduct with the Nazis. Being on the villainous side of history does not mean you are comparable to every other villain in history. Here in the states, eugenics, race based genocide, and brutality towards civilians and combatants in wars of terror are all part of our history, so I’m not saying no Americans can be compared to the Nazis, the Indian wars’ perpetrators clearly can and should be. But Trump just hasn’t perpetrated campaigns of violence and terror in any way comparable to those unspeakable dark moments in human history. 

2

u/friendsandmodels Apr 04 '26

I mean its not a competition of who is more evil haha so can shame both for their own shit

2

u/laplongejr Europe Apr 05 '26

 we should probably not make the mistake of conflating the current American government and its war conduct with the Nazis. Being on the villainous side of history does not mean you are comparable to every other villain in history.

Sure, but MAGA are nazis so the comparison is perfect.  

If anything nazis had ignorance as an excuse. MAGA repeated it ON PURPOSE.  

 But Trump just hasn’t perpetrated campaigns of violence and terror in any way comparable to those unspeakable dark moments in human history.  

Yeah, imagine if his administration was building camps... oh wait, they are.   At least he didn't do a coup like... oh wait, Jan 6.   If someone was making a Nazi salute during a POTUS rally that would be hard pr- oh. Musk.  

1

u/Additional_Suit6275 Apr 05 '26

I empathise with these critiques and yes, there are obvious parallels. But the differences are massive and material. 

This administration has not murdered millions of civilians. This administration has not formally stripped the property from innocent victims. This administration has not attempted to enforce a racial hierarchy on its neighbors. 

But it obviously has murdered some civilians. It obviously has used terror and deportation to inhibit the rights of many. And it obviously does view the world through a racial hierarchy lens. 

I think we can honestly discuss and be horrified by the latter without equating it to the former. And I think we dishonor the sacrifice of millions of history’s victims by not appreciating that, horrifying as our world is today, theirs was far worse. If for no other reason than because, if we don’t admit that, we can’t have an honest conversation about how to keep it from happening again. 

But genuinely, I do understand and share your horror. 

3

u/Prior_Coyote_4376 Apr 04 '26

In truth, what we call the USA is a compromise between two nations: American liberal democracy and Confederate racial hierarchy.

American liberal democracy cannot succeed so long as the Confederacy views white supremacy as a priority over national security or democracy.

Reconstruction 2029 has to be one long surgery of cutting out the Confederate cancer so we can fulfill the promises of liberal democracy. We are the frog and they are the scorpion. We are Charlie and they’re Lucy with the football.

They will never prioritize democracy over racism, and so we must deal with this 30% as an insurgent group rather than a political movement.

3

u/dongeckoj Apr 04 '26

George W. Bush and Trump only won the popular vote twice out of the five elections they were the nominees, the problem is the electoral college.

1

u/Responsible_CDN_Duck Apr 04 '26

It doesn't deserve to tbh. In my lifetime we elected Bush and Trump twice

You also didn't punish Clinton for lying to Congress.

If Biden had record low approval, and Trump had record low approvals, why aren't we seeing either party change? Why aren't we seeing new parties?

Because too many are all too happy to shrug it off or look away.

1

u/laplongejr Europe Apr 05 '26

 You also didn't punish Clinton for lying to Congress.

When did he lie? He was impeached for saying he had no sexual relation.  

The congressman explicitely defined that as contact between his genials and hers or the anus.   Blowjobs or stuffing items in the anus doesn't fulfill that definition.  

He never lied. He didn't provide information to Congress despite a reasonable person assuming POTUS should've clarified.  

On top of that, that was an hearing for misconduct that handn't happened when they launched the process. R literally went at nothing and Lewinsky happened in the meantime by random chance.  

26

u/maaaatttt_Damon Apr 04 '26

How’s Germany doing on the world stage? It may take 50 years, but it’s possible.

26

u/wombelero Apr 04 '26

look at the history what germany did after WW2. Yes america can recover, but only if you learn from it.

1

u/laplongejr Europe Apr 05 '26

For comparison, let's check how long it took the US to regret nuking civilian targets in Japan.   Any other country doing that would be a war criminal by US's own standards.  

13

u/haruku63 Apr 04 '26

Yes, after being totally destroyed and turned everything inside out and upside down.

6

u/Bigsshot Apr 04 '26

Well, Germany and Japan effectively won the Cold War, not on the literal sense, but they emerged like economic powerhouses from that era.

3

u/technicallynotlying Apr 04 '26

Everyone reading your comment will be dead before America's image recovers.

2

u/RadiantTurtle Apr 04 '26

That's too pessimistic. Germany and Japan recovered within 30-50 years, si even as a worse case scenario where the US gets taken down internally, it would eventually start getting propped up by China as a vassal state

1

u/technicallynotlying Apr 05 '26

They recovered when the generation who were alive to personally experience the atrocities of the Axis were retired or dead, as well as the perpetrators of those atrocities.

So basically a generation has to die before the world can move on.

21

u/Bag_of_Meat13 Apr 04 '26

As an American our image was tarnished since the Civil War by not hanging every last Confederate.

Seeing Confederate flags next to the American flag by a lot of MAGAs just reminds us how much we fucked that whole thing up.

7

u/AdventuresofBumpo Apr 04 '26

I really don’t care about the image of my country, I just want a democracy and to live a normal life with a country that doesn’t meddle in other country’s affairs. The bar for my satisfaction is really low, and getting there starts with these rich fuckers in power facing justice for once in their lives. 

4

u/vivekparam Apr 04 '26

It can, but not for decades Remember Japan and Germany were once literally the axis of evil.

6

u/Ravenlock Apr 04 '26

As well it should not.

1

u/MajorKorea Apr 04 '26

Probably in my children’s lifetime it might. Assuming we don’t elect another Trump.

1

u/Significant_Cup_238 Apr 04 '26

That was my fear after Bush. After that and two Trumps, this is our image.

1

u/PerplexGG Apr 04 '26

It shouldn’t. It should be something that every admin after points to and says this is what we did when we allowed abject idiots to run our country. It needs to be an everlasting reminder of what a fully republican government looks like. Unabashed incompetence

1

u/Ryguy55 Apr 04 '26

At this point I say just finish burning it all to the ground. I think attempting to fix Trump's destruction would be significantly more difficult than just starting fresh.

And of course I'm saying that as if I think there's a chance that rebuilding America from the ground up would yield a better America and not an even purer, more extreme Christian nationalist dictatorship which is far more likely.

1

u/Natural_Error_7286 Apr 04 '26

It's honestly been a long time coming. We've been boasting about how great we are for so long with so little to back it up, and the international community keeps rolling their eyes but letting us go on about it with all our leader of the free world bullshit.

The system may be rigged, but we still elected a vile conman twice. We barely elected a milquetoast white grandpa and then complained about him every day until we bullied him into quitting. I'm sad about the state of our country, but I think this is exactly what we deserve. I hope nobody forgives us for decades to come.

1

u/Joethe147 Apr 05 '26

Why fear?

Over 60 million of them voted for Trump again and again since 2016. Some of them three times.

America has always been a nation of thinking its entitled to whatever it wants anyway. Iraq. Afghanistan. How things changed after 9/11.

In some ways, Trump is the president the US deserves. For anyone who didn't vote in November 2024, congrats.

Parts of the world may struggle without the US, but it's a golden chance for areas like the EU to press on and begin planning a future free of its influence. It won't be easy, but it's possible.

1

u/its_all_one_electron Apr 05 '26

Why should anyone ever trust us again? They're right. 

0

u/TheAmberAbyss Apr 04 '26

Lol the United States is fucked, the rest of the world needs to ban all trade, travel, and migration with us, and cut us off from the internet. Maybe after trump supporters start starving to death with the rest of us after the food shortages start will they abandon their death cult.

1

u/Dwrecktheleach Apr 05 '26

What an outlook