President Donald Trump’s approval rating has actually ticked up as Democrats in the House of Representatives prepare to hold an impeachment vote, a new poll from Fox News, out Sunday, finds.
The same group of voters remains steady on impeachment, according to the Fox News/Beacon poll.
“Weeks of congressional hearings and debate have failed to move the electorate on impeachment, according to the latest Fox News Poll. At the same time, approval of President Trump’s job performance has climbed three points,” Fox reports. “Currently, 45 percent of voters approve of the job Trump’s doing, up from 42 percent in late October. Over half, 53 percent, disapprove. That lands the president almost exactly where he started the year, as 43 percent approved and 54 percent disapproved in January.”
This is an odd development for the president, who should be facing declining numbers, given the way he’s been portrayed by Democrats and members of the mainstream media these last several weeks– as the villain in an complex conspiracy to collaborate with a foreign power to tank the chances of fellow 2020 presidential contender, former Vice President Joe Biden.
The House released their articles of impeachment last week, settling on two vague accusations — “abuse of power” and “obstruction of Congress” — rather than specific charges of criminal behavior, setting off an upsurge of concern among moderate Democrats and unconvinced independents. Without clear evidence of wrongdoing, the House may vote along party lines to impeach Trump, but it’s unlikely the Senate will move to convict the president and remove him from office (though a Senate trial will pull at least three Democrat presidential contenders off the campaign trail for weeks at the height of primary season).
But in the same week Trump faced Democrats’ accusations of using his office for political gain, Trump inked major trade deals with Canada and Mexico — a deal that Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) happily claimed as bipartisan the same day she announced that the House had drafted articles of impeachment — essentially rewriting the North American Free Trade Agreement, and with China, drawing a months-long trade war to a swift end just before major tariffs kicked in.
For Trump, the news on impeachment may not be as rosy as the news on his approval rating. Support for impeachment remains largely unchanged, even among independents, but is still significant. Democrats favor impeaching and removing the president from office by a shocking 80-20 margin. American voters are evenly split on each charge, with roughly the same number who support impeachment saying that they agree the president should be convicted on both abuse of power and obstruction of Congress.
One key element of the poll does spell good news for the president going into 2020, however: when it comes to the ballot box, Americans don’t seem to be letting the impeachment sway them from voting to re-elect Donald Trump.
Democrats remain concerned about the political fallout from impeachment hearings, which is why so few are ready to say publicly that they will vote to impeach the President when the House gavels into session this week. Nationally, at least according to the Fox News poll, voters seem just as likely to return their House Member to office whether they vote to impeach or not, but in key districts — especially moderate Dem and Trump-loving districts in battleground states — the numbers are different and voters aren’t happy.