President Donald Trump’s approval rating among white voters has reversed.
According to an Economist/YouGov poll, the percentage of white voters who support Trump has increased by 8 percentage points after declining. This improvement in polling means that Trump’s approval rating among this demographic is now positive.
Why does this matter?
White people are a key segment of Trump’s base. According to the Associated Press, more than 8 in 10 Trump voters in the 2024 election were white. The Pew Research Center found that 55% of white voters voted for Trump in 2024 and 2020, and 54% of white voters chose him in 2016.
Maintaining his base will be crucial for the Republican Party as a whole in the midterm elections in November 2026.
Note
According to exit polls, Trump’s net favorability rating among whites rose from a historic low of -2 percentage points in July, when 47% of respondents said they approved of him and 49% disapproved, to +6 percentage points in September. In this latest poll, 51% of whites said they approved of Trump and 45% disapproved.
Trump’s favorability rating has also shifted across demographic groups. Support among rural voters has declined, according to new exit polls. Meanwhile, other national polls have indicated that some people have a negative opinion of the president.
According to a recent YouGov poll for The Times, the percentage of people disapproving of Trump’s performance rose from 52% in April to 57% in July.
Last month, a Quinnipiac poll showed the president’s approval rating at 37%, compared to 55% of those who disapproved of the president, a new low according to these researchers.
Public Opinions
William F. Hall, assistant professor of political science and management at Webster University in St. Louis, Missouri, told Newsweek that this shift “may reflect factors that are not necessarily obvious, at least at first glance.”
“This current shift in President Trump’s popularity, from negative to positive, particularly among white voters, may also reflect a more worrisome, and increasingly worrying, trend toward greater division and tension among different demographic groups in our society, along racial and ethnic lines, as well as a widening and deepening of the racial polarization our population is experiencing more generally.”
What happens next?
Trump’s popularity is expected to fluctuate across different demographic groups throughout his presidency.
His popularity will be seriously tested in the November 2026 midterm elections.
