Trump’s approval sinks as Republicans soften, polling mirrors 2018 warning signs

Trump’s standing with the public has slipped to its weakest point of his second term, and the broader mood around the country is turning sour with it. In the latest NBC News Decision Desk poll, 37% of adults approved of Trump’s performance as president while 63% disapproved, including 50% who strongly disapproved. Just one-third of Americans said the country was on the right track, while two-thirds said it was on the wrong track, the bleakest outlook NBC has measured in Decision Desk polling since Trump returned to office.

The softness is not limited to independents and Democrats. Republicans remain broadly behind Trump, but even that support has weakened. In the new poll, 83% of Republicans approved of his job performance, down 4 points from NBC’s late January and early February survey. The share of Republicans who strongly approved also fell, from 58% to 52%. That matters because the current dip is not just about partisan disagreement; it shows the intensity of his own coalition is not as solid as it was earlier in the year.

Issue-specific numbers were weaker still. Two-thirds of respondents disapproved of Trump’s handling of inflation, and two-thirds also disapproved of his handling of the Iran conflict. That split suggests the problem is not confined to a single controversy. Voters are registering frustration on the pocketbook issue that usually dominates daily life, as well as on a foreign policy crisis that carries national security and humanitarian stakes.

The larger political danger comes from how familiar these numbers look. NBC pointed to a RealClearPolitics national polling average of 42.4% approval and 55.6% disapproval, placing Trump in territory similar to where he stood a year into his first term at the start of 2018. That year ended with Trump and Republicans taking a midterm drubbing that flipped the House to Democrats. NBC also noted that Trump’s current approval sits in the range of other recent presidents whose parties later lost House control, a reminder that durable weakness in the national mood can matter more than day-to-day partisan noise.

Steve Kornacki framed the data as a warning sign for Republicans heading into the 2026 midterms, when the House majority will be at stake. The lesson from the polling is not that Trump has lost his base, but that his base is softer, the public is more negative, and the path to another governing majority is narrowing.