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Most say child care costs ‘major problem': Survey
Most say child care costs ‘major problem': Survey

The Hill

time10-07-2025

  • Business
  • The Hill

Most say child care costs ‘major problem': Survey

Most Americans said that the costs of child care are a 'major problem,' and most are in favor of efforts to provide free or low-cost day care, according to a new survey released on Thursday. The new Associated Press (AP)-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research found that most Americans, 76 percent, agree that child care cost is a major issue, while 18 percent said it is a 'minor' problem. Some five percent said it is not a problem. Nearly two-thirds of respondents, 64 percent, are in favor of providing free or low-cost daycare for kids who are too young to attend public school. Around 15 percent oppose it, while another 20 percent are neither in favor nor opposed to the option. The majority of Americans, 67 percent, want the federal government to require employers to provide paid leave for new parents, according to the poll. Around 12 percent are not in favor, while another 20 percent are neither in favor nor opposed to it, according to the poll. 'Everyone kind of agrees that it's a problem that we need to address. By having this issue out there, it really is driving a lot of bipartisan conversations,' the executive director of the First Five Years Fund advocacy organization Sarah Rittling told the AP. Both Democrats and Republicans have at times offered support for expanding the child tax credit, arguing it would be a way to help families. More than seven-in-10 respondents, 72 percent, said they are supportive of upping the annual child tax credit from $2,000 to $2,500 for parents who are U.S. citizens, according to a Washington Post/Ipsos poll that was released in mid-June. The AP-NORC survey was conducted from June 5-9 among 1,158 adults. The margin of error was four percentage points.

Trump's approval ratings remain under water in first week of May polling
Trump's approval ratings remain under water in first week of May polling

USA Today

time09-05-2025

  • Business
  • USA Today

Trump's approval ratings remain under water in first week of May polling

Trump's approval ratings remain under water in first week of May polling Show Caption Hide Caption President Trump announces 'tremendous' UK trade deal President Donald Trump announced a trade deal with the U.K., the first trade agreement since he imposed sweeping tariffs in April. As the first week of May comes to a close, President Donald Trump is still slogging through low approval ratings. A series of polls released last week, coinciding with President Donald Trump's first 100 days in office on April 29, solidified that a growing percentage of Americans were not too pleased with his job performance. His approval numbers reached historic lows not seen by any other president in recent decades, except for Trump himself in 2017. In the past week, there've been several agency shake-ups, a tense Oval Office meeting with Canada's new leader, social media posts about new holidays and remarks over possible tax hikes, and ongoing back-and-forths with several nations and industries over Trump's aggressive import tariffs. Over that course of time, the president's approval rating has largely remained unchanged, give or take a few points, based on averages of multiple polls. Latest polls on Trump's approval rating According to recent polling data published by RealClearPolitics, Trump's approval rating is 45.2% as of the first week of May. This aggregate does not include a poll released on May 9 by the Associated Press and NORC Center for Public Affairs Research, which reflects a disapproval rating of 51.1% for the second-term president. Just a week earlier, the aggregate listed a 45% approval number on May 2. An aggregation from The New York Times, which includes the AP-NORC poll and leaves out a recent survey from right-leaning Rasmussen Reports, has a similar average: 44% of Americans are happy with Trump's job performance, while 51% disapprove. It's a two-point uptick in favorability from their average on May 2, which catalogued a 42% aggregate approval and a 52% disapproval. Here's how the latest few polls measured the president's approval among Americans. Associated Press-NORC poll 41% approve 57% disapprove Conducted by The Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research, the survey also focused on Americans' views on higher education and Trump's recent moves to defund some universities. The results show the public's perception of the president's actions toward higher education is in line with his overall approval rating, with more disapproving than approving. Sixty percent of adults disapprove of Trump's handling of issues related to colleges and universities, the poll results found, with Democrats and independents substantially more displeased with the policies. The survey of 1,175 U.S. adults was conducted May 1-5 and has a margin of error of ±4 percentage points. The Economist/YouGov poll 42% approve 52% disapprove Pollsters also asked about the economy, with 40% of respondents saying the U.S. is currently in a recession, while 35% say it isn't and 25% say they aren't sure. The survey of 1,850 U.S. adults was conducted May 2-5 and has a margin of error of ±3.5 percentage points. Morning Consult poll 46% approve 52% disapprove Respondents to the survey expressed disapproval of Trump's trade policies, with pollsters concluding voters are 7 points more likely to disapprove than approve of Trump's handling of trade. Morning Consult says this marks a record low in trade policy approvals in surveys conducted since Trump took office in January. The survey of 2,263 registered voters was conducted May 2-4 and has a margin of error of ±2 percentage points. Kathryn Palmer is a trending news reporter for USA TODAY. You can reach her at kapalmer@ and on X @KathrynPlmr.

Elon Musk Has Become Toxic Waste to the Average Person, New Poll Shows
Elon Musk Has Become Toxic Waste to the Average Person, New Poll Shows

Yahoo

time28-04-2025

  • Automotive
  • Yahoo

Elon Musk Has Become Toxic Waste to the Average Person, New Poll Shows

A new Associated Press-backed poll has shown that billionaire Elon Musk's popularity is declining rapidly. According to the survey, which was conducted in partnership with the NORC Center for Public Affairs Research, a measly 33 percent of US adults now view Musk as "very or somewhat favorable" as of April — an incredible reversal, since before his hard turn into bitter reactionary politics, he was almost universally beloved. Even respondents who identified as Republican are following the trend, sinking from 21 percent to 25 percent unfavorable between December and April, indicating even the voter base Musk has been pandering to since president Donald Trump's reelection campaign are starting to get tired of his relentlessly boorish behavior. The poll corroborates previous findings that Musk's popularity has fallen off a cliff after he took a proverbial — and literal — chainsaw to the government budget. His careless and flawed approach has proven extremely unpopular, threatening to cut off millions of people from Social Security, leaving millions more at the risk of hunger and starvation, and ripping out funding for popular initiatives like lifesaving medical research. Besides tanking favorability, the vast majority of US adults also say that Elon Musk has "too much" influence on the US federal government, according to the latest poll. Musk's embrace of extremist views, including the time he made multiple fascist salutes, joked about the Holocaust, and appeared at several far-right nationalist party meetings in Europe, has also proven extremely divisive. His behavior has inspired an entire movement targeting his EV maker Tesla, with countless largely peaceful protesters targeting hundreds of dealerships in and outside of the United States. The drop in Musk's popularity is stunning, especially considering the sheer amount of goodwill the entrepreneur had attracted earlier in his career. Once beloved for revolutionizing the automotive and space industry, Musk has quickly become one of the most alienating and contentious personalities in the world in a matter of years. According to polling averages aggregated by statistician Nate Silver, Musk's net favorability has plunged from a glowing +29 in 2016, when Trump was elected the first time, to his current depths, in which he's seen as a paragon of out-of-touch wealth and greed. "He thinks you run a government like you run a business," said a respondent and 75-year-old retiree from Pennsylvania, per the AP. "And you don't do that. One is for the benefit of the people, and the other is for the benefit of the corporation." More on Musk: Fed Up Trump Officials Are Calling Musk "Crazy Uncle Elon"

Majority of Americans rate Trump as ‘terrible' or ‘poor' president in his second term, poll finds
Majority of Americans rate Trump as ‘terrible' or ‘poor' president in his second term, poll finds

The Independent

time26-04-2025

  • Politics
  • The Independent

Majority of Americans rate Trump as ‘terrible' or ‘poor' president in his second term, poll finds

The majority of Americans say Donald Trump has been a 'terrible' or 'poor' president in his first 100 days in office, according to new polling from the Associated Press -NORC Center for Public Affairs Research. About four in 10 Americans say Trump has been a 'terrible' president in his second term, and about one in 10 say he has been 'poor,' giving a total of 52 percent. In contrast, about three in 10 say he has been 'great' or 'good,' while just under two in 10 say he has been 'average.' Many Americans do not agree with the president's aggressive efforts to quickly enact his agenda, a new poll finds, and even Republicans are not overwhelmingly convinced that his attention has been in the right place. Americans are nearly twice as likely to say Trump has been mostly focusing on the wrong priorities as to say he has been focusing on the right ones, according to the survey. However, most survey respondents have not been shocked by the drama of Trump's first 100 days. About seven in 10 U.S. adults say the first few months of Trump's second term have been mostly what they expected, and only about 3 in 10 say the president's actions have been mostly unexpected. But that does not mean they are pleased with how those opening months have gone. In fact, Democrats seem even unhappier with the reality of the second Trump term than before he was sworn in on January 20. About three-quarters of Democrats say Trump is focused on the wrong topics, and about seven in 10 think he has been a 'terrible' president so far. That is an increase from January, when about 6 in 10 anticipated that he would be 'terrible.' Rahsaan Henderson, a Democrat from California, said: 'It has been one of the longest 100 days I've ever had to sit through.' 'I think the next four years will be a test of seeing who can resist the most and continue defying whatever he's trying to do, since he defies everything, including the Supreme Court,' said Henderson, 40. Republicans are largely standing behind the president, but are ambivalent about what he has chosen to emphasize. About seven in 10 say he has been at least a 'good' president. But only about half say he has mostly had the right priorities so far, while about one-quarter say it has been about an even mix, and about one in 10 said Trump has mostly had the wrong priorities. 'He's really doing the stuff that he said he was going to do,' said Tanner Bergstrom, 29, a Republican from Minnesota. He is 'not making a bunch of promises and getting into office and nothing happens. ... I really like that. Even if it's some stuff I don't agree with, it's still doing what he said he was going to do.' Those who were surprised by Trump's first few months seem to have had a rude awakening. The people who say Trump's actions were not what they expected — who are mostly Democrats and independents — are more likely to say Trump has had mostly the wrong priorities and that he has been a poor or terrible president, compared with the people who mostly expected his actions. About four in 10 in the survey approve of how Trump is handling the presidency overall. The issue of immigration is a relative strength. According to the poll, 46 percent of U.S. adults approve of his handling of the issue, which is slightly higher than his overall approval. But there are also indications that foreign policy, trade negotiations, and the economy could prove problematic as he aims to prove his approach will benefit the country. Trump's approval on those issues is much lower than it is on immigration. Only about four in 10 U.S. adults approve of how he is handling each. Republicans are less likely to approve of Trump's approach to trade and the economy than to immigration. There are additional signals that some Trump supporters may not be thrilled with his performance so far. The share of Republicans who say he has been at least a 'good' president has fallen about 10 percentage points since January. They also have grown a bit more likely to say Trump will be either 'poor' or 'terrible,' although only 16% describe his first few months that way. Republican Stephanie Melnyk, 45, from Tennessee, is supportive of Trump's handling of the presidency more broadly but said she did not approve of his handling of foreign affairs, particularly on the war in Ukraine. Melnyk's family emigrated from Ukraine, and she said Trump is 'trying for a quick fix that's not going to last' and that Russian President Vladimir Putin 'is not to be trusted.' Melnyk, who voted for Trump largely for his positions on immigration, said she wished the president would stay on script. 'He sounds like he can be very condescending, and it sounds like my way or the highway,' Melnyk said. 'It's like, dude. You're not 12.' It's common, though, for a president's standing to be at its best before taking office and beginning the work of governing. And Trump continues to hold high approval ratings from Republicans. About four in 10 Americans have a favorable opinion of Trump, roughly in line with his approval number. Among Republicans, the figure is about double: About eight in 10 Republicans have a positive view of the president, and about the same share approves of how he is handling the presidency. About one-third of U.S. adults have a favorable opinion of Vice President JD Vance, including about seven in 10 Republicans. Those Republicans interviewed were particularly fond of efforts to scale back the size of the federal government, led by billionaire outside adviser Elon Musk and Trump's cost-cutting initiative, the Department of Government Efficiency, known as DOGE. 'Overall, I would have to say that I'm happy with the Trump presidency,' said Matthew Spencer, 30, a Republican from Texas. 'I think that the Department of Government Efficiency has made great strides in reducing our spending, and I also agree with putting America first. I agree with the policies he's put in as far as border protection and America standing for itself again, as far as the tariffs.' 'We're only three months in, but so far, so good,' said Carlos Guevara, 46, who lives in Florida. Guevara, a Republican, said DOGE has been a 'smash hit' and on tariffs, and while there may be short-term pain, 'if that does encourage businesses to start manufacturing here ... then that'll wash out over time.' Democrats have a much bleaker outlook on the economy than they held before Trump took office. The poll also found that the vast majority of Democrats think he has 'gone too far' on deportations and tariffs. Gabriel Antonucci, 26, a Democrat who recently moved to South Carolina, said Trump's second term is 'just a lot more ridiculous' than he had anticipated. 'It really seems like he is doing everything he can to make the wrong decisions,' Antonucci said. 'Things are probably going to be worse in four years than they are right now.' The AP-NORC poll of 1,260 adults was conducted April 17-21, using a sample drawn from NORC's probability-based AmeriSpeak Panel, which is designed to be representative of the U.S. population. The margin of sampling error for adults overall is plus or minus 3.9 percentage points. Additional reporting by the Associated Press.

How public's shift on immigration paved the way for Trump's crackdown on migrants
How public's shift on immigration paved the way for Trump's crackdown on migrants

New Indian Express

time25-04-2025

  • Politics
  • New Indian Express

How public's shift on immigration paved the way for Trump's crackdown on migrants

PASSAIC: Alleged gang members without criminal records wrongly sent to a notorious prison in El Salvador. International students detained by masked federal agents for writing opinion columns or attending campus demonstrations. American citizens, visa holders and visitors stopped at airports, detained for days or facing deportation for minor infractions. Since returning to the White House, US President Donald Trump has launched an unprecedented campaign of immigration enforcement that has pushed the limits of executive power and clashed with federal judges trying to restrain him. But unlike in his first term, Trump's efforts have not sparked the kind of widespread condemnation or protests that led him to retreat from some unpopular positions. Instead, immigration has emerged as one of Trump's strongest issues in public polling, reflecting both his grip on the Republican base and a broader shift in public sentiment that is driven in part, interviews suggest, by anger at the policies of his predecessor, Democrat Joe Biden. The White House has seized on this shift, mocking critics and egging on Democrats to engage on an issue that Trump's team sees as a win. "I think this is another men/women's sports thing for the Democrats," Trump said in an interview with Time magazine published Friday, referring to the cultural wars debate over transgender rights that Trump campaign aides saw as a key driver of support in November. "America's changed," said pollster Frank Luntz, a longtime ally of Republicans who has been holding focus groups with voters to discuss immigration. "This is the one area where Donald Trump still has significant and widespread public support." Luntz said voters dismayed by the historically large influx of migrants under Biden are now "prepared to accept a more extreme approach." "Make no mistake," he added. "The public may not embrace it, but they definitely support it. And this is actually his strongest area as he approaches his 100th day (in office)." Changing views A poll from The Associated Press - NORC Center for Public Affairs Research finds that immigration is a relative high point for Trump compared with other issues, including his approach to the economy, foreign policy and trade negotiations. Slightly fewer than half of US adults, 46%, say they approve of Trump's handling of the issue, compared with his overall job approval rating of 39%, according to the survey. The poll was conducted April 17-21, a period that included a trip by Sen. Chris Van Hollen, D-Md., to El Salvador to demand that Kilmar Abrego Garcia be released from prison after the US government admitted he was wrongly deported. In the 2020 election, few voters considered immigration the most important issue facing the country, according to AP VoteCast, a survey of registered voters in all 50 states. Four years later, after Republicans and conservative media had hammered Biden for his policies and often cast migrant US-Mexico border crossings as an invasion, immigration had risen above health care, abortion and crime. It was second only to the economy. Under Biden, migrant apprehensions spiked to more than 2 million two years in a row. Republican governors in border states bused migrants by the tens of thousands to cities across the country, including to New York, where migrants were placed in shelters and hotels, straining budgets. Voters in the 2024 election were also more open to tougher immigration policies than the 2020 electorate. Last November, 44% of voters said most immigrants living in the United States illegally should be deported to their home countries, according to AP VoteCast, compared with 29% in 2020. Immigration remains a relative strength for Trump today: 84% of Republicans approve of Trump's immigration approach, according to the April AP-NORC poll, compared with 68% who approve of how he is handling trade negotiations. The poll found about 4 in 10 US adults "strongly" or "somewhat" favor Trump's policy of sending Venezuelan immigrants who authorities say are gang members to El Salvador, with an additional 22% saying they neither favor nor oppose it. About 4 in 10 were opposed. Americans are more opposed, broadly, to revoking foreign students' visas over their participation in pro-Palestinian activism, with about half opposed and about 3 in 10 in support. The changing views are evident in places like northern New Jersey's suburban Passaic County, one of the former Democratic strongholds where Trump overperformed in November. Trump became the first Republican to win the county in more than 30 years. He carried the heavily Latino city of Passaic and significantly increased his support in Paterson, the state's third-largest city, which is majority Latino and also has a large Muslim community. He drew 13,819 votes after winning 3,999 in 2016. Having lost New Jersey by nearly 16 percentage points to Biden in 2020, Trump narrowed that margin to 6 percentage points last year. Paterson resident Sunny Cumur, 54, a truck driver who immigrated from Turkey in the late 1990s, describes himself as a Democrat who doesn't usually vote. But he wanted Trump to win, he said, because he was concerned about the border under Biden. While studies show immigrants are generally less likely to commit crimes than native-born Americans, local news in New York and other cities frequently featured what Trump took to calling "migrant crime." "What Biden did, they opened all the borders, and a lot of people come here for political asylum. Come on! They don't even check if they are terrorists or not," Cumur said. He complained that newcomers willing to work for lower wages have been undercutting workers like him. "Throw 'em out. I don't want to live with criminals," he said. Still, other supporters worry Trump is taking things too far. Republican Manuel Terrero, 39, a real estate agent from Clifton, said he was drawn to Trump because of what felt like "chaos" under Biden, with too many people crossing the border and too much crime in neighboring New York. "It shouldn't be allowed," said Terrero, an immigrant from the Dominican Republic. Trump "is doing a lot of good things. And that is one of them, stopping the people that are coming here to create chaos. And the people that have criminal records, send them back. But I am against (deporting) the people that are working," he said. "I don't think it's the right way to do it." Rep. Nellie Pou, D-N.J., who was elected last year to represent the area in Congress, said her constituents believe strongly in border security but stand by her advocacy for immigrants. She recently joined Democrats on a trip to the US-Mexico border. "I do not want anyone that may be a danger to come to our country to harm any of our citizens. No one wants that. And I firmly believe that's what people in our district and across America want," she said. At the same time, she said, "Our country was made of immigrants... So I believe there's a place for someone who comes in the legal ways." A new paradigm Trump burst onto the political scene in 2015 by labeling Mexican immigrants as criminals and rapists and pledging to build "a great wall." He spent much of his first term focused on the border. One of his first actions in office was to impose a travel ban barring the entry of citizens from seven Muslim-majority countries. That caused chaos at airports and protests across the nation. The policy was quickly blocked by the courts, forcing his administration to offer three broader iterations, the last of which was eventually upheld by the Supreme Court. The next flashpoint came in 2018, when border officials began separating families detained after illegally crossing the border. In some cases, children were forcibly removed from their parents under a "zero tolerance" policy, and the parents were sometimes deported without their kids. Images of children held in cages at border facilities and audio recordings of young children crying for their parents drew intense backlash, with thousands participating in hundreds of marches across the country. The protesters included soon-to-be Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, D-N.Y., who was photographed in 2018 breaking down outside a facility in Texas being used to detain migrant children. Republicans joined in that condemnation. Gov. Greg Abbott, R-Texas, called the separations "tragic and heartrending" in a letter that urged Congress to act. "This disgraceful condition must end," he wrote. "All Americans are rightly horrified by the images we are seeing on the news, children in tears pulled away from their mothers and fathers. This must stop," said Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Texas. He introduced legislation mandating that apprehended families be kept together. Bowing to pressure and concerned about the impact on the upcoming midterm elections, Trump halted the policy. This time around, with border crossings down, Trump has shifted focus to expelling people already in the United States. He is expanding the limits of executive power and jousting with judges as he uses old laws and rarely used provisions to label hundreds of men gang members so they can be deported without being able to challenge their cases in court. Secretary of State Marco Rubio — who as a senator once tried to negotiate a bipartisan immigration package — has moved to expel people in the US legally over political beliefs he deems counter to US foreign policy interests. Their targets have included hundreds of students and others with legal status, including those on student visas or holding green cards conferring permanent residency, as well as those who have sought asylum using legal channels. Jorge Loweree, of the American Immigration Council, a nonprofit advocacy group, said Trump was doing something "that's wholly new in historical terms." "It's critical that people understand what the administration is doing," said Loweree, the council's managing director of programs and strategy. "We have an administration that believes they can disappear who they want, where they want, to anywhere they want." Loweree argued that even if voters in November rejected what they saw as chaos at the border, that "doesn't necessarily mean that they support these very draconian measures that are being implemented today." Few elected Republicans are speaking out, though some of Trump's outside allies have criticized what they see as overreach. Joe Rogan, the popular podcast host who endorsed Trump late in the campaign, voiced alarm at the case of Andry Hernandez Romero, a gay makeup artist from Venezuela with no criminal record who was among those sent to El Salvador's maximum-security CECOT prison. "You gotta get scared that people who are not criminals are getting like lassoed up and deported and sent to like El Salvador prisons," Rogan told his listeners. "That's horrific. And again, that's bad for the cause. Like the cause is let's get the gang members out. Everybody agrees. But let's not (have) innocent gay hairdressers get lumped up with the gangs." Signs of change? The April AP-NORC poll found that about half of Americans say Trump has "gone too far" when it comes to deporting immigrants living in the US illegally, compared with about 6 in 10 who say he's "gone too far" on imposing new tariffs on other countries. It found Americans split on mass deportations, with about 4 in 10 in favor of deporting all immigrants living in the US illegally and a similar share opposed. The percentage who support mass deportations is down slightly from an AP-NORC poll conducted in January, just before Trump took office. Still, about one-third of US adults say Trump's actions have been "about right" on immigration, and about 2 in 10 think he hasn't gone far enough. One case that has gained traction nationally is that of Abrego Garcia, the Maryland resident from El Salvador who was sent to CECOT despite an immigration court order preventing his deportation. Trump officials have said that Abrego Garcia has ties to the MS-13 gang, a claim Abrego Garcia's attorneys deny, and noted that his wife once sought a protective order against him. El Salvador's president, Nayib Bukele, has said he will not let Abrego Garcia leave the country. More Democrats have traveled to El Salvador to highlight the case. And people angry about the situation have confronted Republican lawmakers, including at a contentious town hall Wednesday hosted by Iowa Sen. Chuck Grassley, during which several members of the audience shouted at him to push for Abrego Garcia's return. The White House has embraced the fight. "A request for Democrats — please continue to make defending criminal illegal immigrants your top messaging point," wrote Trump's director of communications, Steven Cheung. Some in the party have urged it to steer clear. Gov. Gavin Newsom, D-Calif., called the case a "distraction" from issues such as tariffs that have emerged as a bigger weakness for Trump. "This is the debate (Republicans) want. This is their 80-20 issue, as they've described it," he said of Republicans on his podcast. "It's a tough case, because," he said, it risks people wondering, "are they defending MS-13?" But Dan Pfeiffer, a former senior adviser to President Barack Obama, is urging Democrats to seize on the case. He says border issues are "much more nuanced than 'immigration good for Trump, bad for Democrats'" and believes that voters are on their side. "If we can't stand up against the illegal rendition of the father of a US child to a prison known for torture, then I don't really know what we're doing," he said.

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