Congratulations are in surely in order today for Donald Trump.
See, the President just made history.
Of course to let Trump tell it, he’s made all kinds of history. His inauguration was the most watched in history. His Electoral College win was the largest in history. His recent jaunt across the Mideast and Europe was the most successful overseas trip in presidential history. He’s gotten more done in his first four months in office than any other president in history. Etc. etc.
Remember, those are all claims he’s actually made. And it’s all lies. Every single last bit of it. In the case of the inauguration and the Electoral College claims, they are demonstrably and objectively false – and yet he still refuses to acknowledge that what he said about them wasn’t, isn’t, and never will be true.
But as noted here at the outset, Trump made real history on Monday. Here’s Gallup to explain:
WASHINGTON, D.C. — Donald Trump averaged 41% job approval during his first quarter as president, 14 percentage points lower than any other president in Gallup’s polling history. Bill Clinton had the previous low mark of 55%. The average first-quarter rating among post-World War II presidents elected to their first term is 61%, with John Kennedy’s 74% the highest.
No president before Trump had an initial approval rating below 50%. His poor debut followed his subpar ratings on other measures during the presidential campaign and his presidential transition.
In mid-February, before the end of Trump’s first month, his approval rating briefly fell below 40%, earlier in his presidency than anyone before him.
Only 9% of Democrats on average have approved of the job Trump is doing to date. That is nearly 20 points lower than any other president has received from supporters of the opposition party and 35 points below the pre-Trump historical average opposition-party approval rating.
Trump’s anemic early approval is also attributable to historically low ratings from political independents. To date, 37% of independents have approved of the job Trump is doing, on average. All other newly elected presidents had 51% or higher approval among independents during their first quarters, with the historical average before Trump at 61%.
So yeah, Trump made all kinds of history in his first few months in office.
But something tells us he won’t be touting these numbers on Twitter.
*******
Meanwhile, in fantasy land…
Trump on himself: “Never has there been a president, with few exceptions…who’s passed more legislation, who’s done more things”@PolitiFact pic.twitter.com/4ZFNDrcOuL
— Bradd Jaffy (@BraddJaffy) June 12, 2017
I heard his opening comments and really did laugh out loud – no one home but me and I laughed out loud. Then I heard some of his buddies around that table praise him and thank him and make jokes about the media etc. and turned the TV off. And he rants about Fake News. pleeeeze!
– Murphy