Amid war in the Middle East and the US’s lingering immigration crisis, President Joe Biden is confronting growing dissatisfaction in the electorate and a challenging political climate that appears to be deepening the gap between himself and Republican front runner Donald Trump, according to an NBC News poll released on Sunday.
Despite the country’s economic upturn, record job creation, and reining in of inflation, the survey rated Biden trailing Trump with a deficit of more than 20 points with respect to his handling of the economy, and more than 30 points behind Trump for his handling of immigration and the border. Trump also rated a 16-point lead over Biden in terms of competence and effectiveness, a total turnaround from 2020, when Biden was 9 points ahead of Trump in this category before Trump lost the election.
With fewer than three in ten respondents approving of his handling of the Israel-Hamas conflict, Biden’s popularity rating in this poll has plummeted to the lowest point during his administration – 37%.
In a hypothetical 2024 general-election battle, the survey shows Trump topping Biden by 5 points among registered voters, 47%-42%. While this narrow lead falls within the poll’s margin of error, polling over the last year indicates a marked shift in this direction. In the four NBC News polls since July 2023, Biden has been dipping while Trump has largely held steady.
The poll does provide some good news for Biden. Voters asked about whether they would vote for Biden or Trump if the former president is convicted of a felony chose Biden. However, that put Biden only 2 points ahead, also within the margin of error.
According to Democratic pollster Jeff Horwitt of Hart Research Associates, who conducted the NBC poll along with Republican pollster Bill McInturff and his team at Public Opinion Strategies, the results show “a presidency in peril.”
The NBC News poll, conducted Jan. 26-30, comes after Trump won the Republican party’s presidential nominating contests in Iowa and New Hampshire, and while the Israel-Hamas war enters its fourth month, amid positive economic news in the United States, including rising consumer confidence and a record number—more than 300,000—of new jobs created last month.
Experts say that polls are snapshots and not necessarily predictive. Well known election scholar Dr. Costas Panogopoulos, chair of the political science department at Northeastern University, said “They are much less precise than people perceive them to be, but they’re also snapshots in time. They may or may not predict what happens with Election Day.”