Trump approval ratings thread 1.1

[pbrower2a]

We have a game-changer. The President, in a game on the margin of closeness, waked in a base-runner and then gave up a grand slam on the next pitch. The game has gone from 6-1 to 11-1. The game may not be over, but tension has given way to a near-hopelessness. Many have better things eir time than to watch the ensuing formality.

[pbrower2a]

Does anybody expect President Trump to have a good third quarter?

[pbrower2a]

Maybe this isn't the thread for discussing the 2020 D primary dynamics?

Probably not. Assuming that approvals for Donald Trump remain low, Democrats will have an easy target in Trump. They have yet to agree on emphasis, let alone on a personality to defeat him. It will be hard to predict how mass contempt for President Trump will shape the Democratic agenda of 2020.

If President Trump resigns, dies or becomes incapacitated, or is removed from office, then how Mike Pence does will shape the next presidential election.

[pbrower2a]

Huge shift in what should be one of the President's best states:

Arkansas - Talk Business & Politics-Hendrix College poll of Trump approval:

Approve - 50%
Disapprove - 47%

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http://katv.com/news/local/president-trumps-job-approval-in-arkansas-50-47

...I don't know whether the self-pardon talk is relevant to this poll. I would expect that stuff to cut President Trump down more where his approval ratings were strongest and less damage (how could this hurt him more in...  New York or even Michigan, where his approvals are already in the toilet?)

Likewise, but in a state that has voted for a Democratic nominee for president only once since 1948:

Utah

48% Approve
50% Disapprove

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It's unfortunate that we do not have polls of such states as Georgia, Indiana, Missouri, or Ohio against which to see how this self-pardon talk looks.  

The letter F shall signify a favorability poll, as the only polls that I have for Arizona,  Massachusetts and Oklahoma  

Blue, positive and 40-43%  20% saturation
............................ 44-47%  40%
............................ 48-50%  50%
............................ 51-55%  70%
............................ 56%+     90%

Red, negative and  48-50%  20% (raw approval or favorability)
..........................  44-47%  30%
..........................  40-43%  50%
..........................  35-39%  70%
.......................under  35%  90%

White - tie.

More telling may be disapproval ratings. Some of these are favorability ratings, which will get an asterisk.

Disapproval ratings:

Map for this theme:

navy under 40
blue 40-43
light blue 44-47
white 48 or 49
pink 50-54
red 55-59
maroon 60 or higher

* favorability

Colors chosen for partisan affiliation  

[pbrower2a]

More:

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[pbrower2a]

I imagine that the upland south is less stable for trump than some might think. Really, Idaho and Wyoming are the only states that I could firmly say will never leave the Trump column.

West Virginia too maybe?

Maybe Oklahoma.

Let's not get ahead of ourselves. Wait 'till we see some new polls. The consequences of the 'pardon-myself' talk  have yet to sink in. Arkansas was not my first choice of polls to see. Ohio got polled a lot in 2016, and few states could better show any such change. 

But it might soon be time to start "Trump approval ratings thread" 1.2 shortly. In fact I think that I might start it pre-emptively. I got caught with such a change and had to input a bunch of data again. This is as good as any break; the Arkansas poll comes from before the disclosure.

[pbrower2a]

Blank map.

This Gallup average for fifty states is priceless for showing data that I do not have for 22 states altogether, including five states with ten or more electoral votes. of those five states, only Illinois was no mystery...  I expected execrable results in polling of Illinois for Donald Trump and found them (36-58). I was very curious about Georgia (16), Indiana (11), Missouri (10), and especially Ohio (18) and now I have averages from January to July.


In any event, a polling average from January to July  is effectively an estimate of a poll from mid-April. But I have polls from as early as January, and no matter how germane the polls from then were they are less germane than this data.

In any event

(1) I get data that I have never had for 22 of 50 states
(2) The data is objective and relevant, even if dated
(3) I can cast off some old data
(4) I can cast off data from polls that I suspect for being from advocacy groups, favorability polls, and polls with confusing categories such as "Excellent-Good-Fair-Poor", or a composite (which I have for Massachusetts, an estimate that I had based upon several questions on specific issues).
(5) I no longer have the excuse "beggars can't be choosers" for accepting a poll from an advocacy group (unless I trust the pollster).    

Is it completely reliable? No, due to obsolescence. As with a road map which is obsolete even as it is published so is a political poll. But if I am in the middle of nowhere and lost I might use a four-year-old road map to get myself out of a tight spot if something happens to the newer map.

Gallup's daily trackers have been going downward for the President, and the latest data are the right ones. If there is any distortion it is that an average from January to July is closer to an average from April than from now.

I can use some signal to indicate that a poll shown on a national map is from a Gallup average from April.  

So here is the Gallup data, with everything but the District of Columbia and the individual districts of Maine and Nebraska:

Blue, positive and 40-43%  20% saturation
............................ 44-47%  40%
............................ 48-50%  50%
............................ 51-55%  70%
............................ 56%+     90%

Red, negative and  48-50%  20% (raw approval or favorability)
..........................  44-47%  30%
..........................  40-43%  50%
..........................  35-39%  70%
.......................under  35%  90%

White - tie.

...If anything, this map may be too sympathetic to President Trump. Gallup tracking polls have trended downward from January, but they didn't start out well for him, either.  I am not going to calibrate polls of the states downward to adjust for this.  Who knows? The Gallup  average for the states between January-July (average presumed to mean "April") may be more relevant in September than now should events go better for him. I have at most seat-of-the-pants ideas of what may have gone on in states with no other polls (yes, President Trump is in trouble in Indiana and Ohio -- probably worse than this map shows) but that is not how I show polling data. I'm showing polling data and not my estimates.

Besides, you may not like my 'intuitive' estimates, and you would have good cause (my extreme partisanship shows in my prose elsewhere).

I do not dispute Gallup data; I simply put it in different categories that I consider more relevant to predictions of electoral results.  

This becomes a start, and hardly a last word. There are more recent polls, and more relevant ones. Most of them will look worse than what I have on the map.

[pbrower2a]

Gallup 7/24

58% Disapprove (+3)
37% Approve (-2)

Sad!

He's still above water in Missouri and Mississippi though (if barely)!

My map will show that for now, but I would make no predictions with any claim to precision. Those are a January-to-July average. The tracking polls are worse for the President now than they were in January or April. Draw your own conclusions; I will not make those for you.

Paging pbrower2a: Gallup daily tracking poll averages of approvals in all 50 states

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These kind of 50 states polls are almost always garbage for the record.

It's a overtime (January-June) accumulation of data. So the number of respondents should be good, but it's over too long of a time period to matter now and it shouldn't be used in place of currently polling. But it will be good to compare it to the numbers that should come out in January.

I recognize fully the weakness of such a running poll -- most obviously its obsolescence. But such will be all the data that I have for 22 states for which I had no data and more recent or desirable data. I have some polls from March or earlier, for which this data is more germane; I can also reject some favorability polls.

Besides, the statewide data is by the same pollster, same methods between states, and effectively the same time. It is good for contrasting states.

This can be the foundation upon which I show some of the later polls that I already have. Gallup data is probably as good as any.

[pbrower2a]

A few comments before I update the map based upon Gallup data averaging April with later, more germane polls:

1. This map has the virtue of showing (1) all states, (2) with the same methodology, and (3) by the same pollster, (4) over the same time. We can compare apples to apples and oranges to oranges. We need not question whether one prefers PPP to Quinnipiac  or says "Gravis -- yuck" or "ARG -aargh!"    

2. I have suggested that the better that people know Donald Trump the less that they like him. I am guessing that the three states in which he is best known as a businessman are New York, New Jersey (in both states,  polling of him has been execrable), and Connecticut: I now have some polling of Connecticut, and this confirms my suspicion. This should be a fair warning. Political figures usually have some affinities at the least of culture to the areas in which they live. Although it is possible to do badly in one's own state or in one in which people have obvious connections due to a poor fit to the partisan trend in that state (Mitt Romney did not fare well in California, Michigan, or Massachusetts in the general election of 2012), the execrable polling results for Trump in New York and New Jersey could be portents of political calamity.  

3. My surprise at Trump doing badly in Texas in polls by Texas Lyceum is weakened with Gallup data. I'm guessing that Donald Trump is the worst possible match for Texas within the Republican Party. That Trump won Texas by high-single instead of the double-digit margins characteristic of Republican nominees for President in the 1980s and from 2000 to 2012 may indicate trends away from the GOP in Texas. But I also see Trump. Texas used to be toward the bottom in economic and social demographics -- but it is now close to the middle in educational achievement, income, public health. With the exception of Virginia it is the former Confederate State  with the best living standards.

Figure that (1) Texas is very urban, (2) that it has large minority populations that hold his anti-intellectualism in contempt, and (3) it has a large percentage of renters, and renters generally do not have warm relationships with their landlords -- and Trump is a stereotype of the rent-collector that puts a crimp in living standards. Indications that Trump could be in more trouble in Texas than in more recent swing states in 2020 is a very bad sign for him. The second-largest electoral prize in America, Texas is bigger than Iowa, Ohio, and Wisconsin together.

4. President Trump may have a 'Mormon problem'. Sure, Utah and Idaho are the states with the most obvious Mormon influence in electoral politics, and they have 'only' ten electoral votes together. But that is as many electoral votes as Minnesota has, and if Minnesota were showing signs of going Republican, Democrats would have cause for concern. More significantly,  even lukewarm Mormon support for the Republican ticket in Arizona could swing twelve electoral votes Democratic in a state usually at best on the fringe of contention for Democrats. Arizona was competitive in 2016.

What's the problem? He fits Mormon values badly, having been involved in gambling casinos, the sorts of places that Mormons must consider just slightly more honorable than whorehouses for the gambling itself and all the liquor and smoking. His family life is hardly a model of Mormon behavior. Mormons believe in quality education (although I would never study archeology at BYU because of distortions of anthropology to fit Mormon theology) that President Trump disparages. Although Mormons are internationalists because of their missionary enterprises they are also patriots. Offend Mormon sensibilities in Utah, and you lose elections.

5. I can discard many polls older than this average in any subsequent maps, and I can signal that the Gallup polling average for the states in which I show it are the oldest statewide polling data for any state for which it is used.  

Blue, positive and 40-43%  20% saturation
............................ 44-47%  40%
............................ 48-50%  50%
............................ 51-55%  70%
............................ 56%+     90%

Red, negative and  48-50%  20% (raw approval or favorability)
..........................  44-47%  30%
..........................  40-43%  50%
..........................  35-39%  70%
.......................under  35%  90%

White - tie.

6. I can also show disapproval ratings from this data for at least 22 more states.



Now for the theme of disapproval as shown in the Gallup data:

navy under 40
blue 40-43
light blue 44-47
white 48 or 49
pink 50-54
red 55-59
maroon 60 or higher

[pbrower2a]

Now with updates since late April:

Arkansas -- Talk Business/Harding College 50-47
Utah -- Salt Lake Tribune/Dan Jones  48-50
Iowa -- Des Moines Register/Selzer 43-52
Colorado  --  Save My Care(D)/PPP 40-56
North Carolina -- Save My Care (D)/PPP 46-50
(an Iowa poll from this group is supplanted by a later one)
New Hampshire --  ARG 27-60
Tennessee -- Vanderbilt University, 52-42
Wisconsin -- Marquette Law School, 41-51
Texas -- Texas Lyceum, 43-51
Virginia -- Quinnipiac, 40-57
Alaska -- Save My Care (D)/PPP , 44-48
Nevada    Save My Care (D)/PPP, 45-50
West Virginia -- Save My Care (D)/PPP. 55-36
California --San Jose Mercury-News, PPIC. 33-63 (likely voters)
Hawaii -- Civil Beat. 32-59
Michigan, EPIC/MRI. 32-61
Pennsylvania, Franklin&Marshall. 36-62

To distinguish the states for which I have only the Gallup data that pose potential controversy, I can shaded those to orange from red and green from blue. (Yellow would apply to ties, but I have no ties in that category).    Those that were shown within the pink and medium-red categories to orange; those   in the light or medium shades of blue will be shaded to green. The outliers like Vermont and Wyoming do not get shaded to green or orange because they are unlikely to create controversy.

Blue, positive and 40-43%  20% saturation
............................ 44-47%  40%
............................ 48-50%  50%
............................ 51-55%  70%
............................ 56%+     90%

Red, negative and  48-50%  20% (raw approval or favorability)
..........................  44-47%  30%
..........................  40-43%  50%
..........................  35-39%  70%
.......................under  35%  90%

White - tie.


Now for the theme of disapproval as shown in the Gallup data:

navy under 40
blue 40-43
light blue 44-47
white 48 or 49
pink 50-54
red 55-59
maroon 60 or higher

Again I am shading the states in the lightest-intensity colors and white toward orange from red, green from blue, or yellow from white if I rely only upon the Gallup polling data for a state with  
between 40% and 54% disapproval.

That yellowing is for one-time use. I don't like this color scheme.  

[pbrower2a]

But back to the more normal color scheme of red to blue

Blue, positive and 40-43%  20% saturation
............................ 44-47%  40%
............................ 48-50%  50%
............................ 51-55%  70%
............................ 56%+     90%

Red, negative and  48-50%  20% (raw approval or favorability)
..........................  44-47%  30%
..........................  40-43%  50%
..........................  35-39%  70%
.......................under  35%  90%

White - tie.


Now for the theme of disapproval as shown in the Gallup data:

navy under 40
blue 40-43
light blue 44-47
white 48 or 49
pink 50-54
red 55-59
maroon 60 or higher

[pbrower2a]

People "disapprove" of Trump yet will support him politically when it actually counts.

States decided by 10% or less in 2016

st mar dis

IA  9.4  52
TX  9.0 51
OH 8.1 48
GA 5.1  50
NC 3.7  50
AZ 3.5  52
FL 1.2  51
WI 0.8 51
PA 0.8 62
MI 0.2 61
NH 0.4 60
MN 1.5 57
NV 2.4 50
ME 3.0 55
CO 4.9 57
VA 5.3 57
NM 8.2 56

The first column is the two-letter postal code for the state. The second is the margin of victory. The third is the disapproval rating.


...Now how does President Trump get re-elected? Even if he doesn't run for re-election, how does he avoid hurting his would-be Republican successor?

A Democrat who wins every state in which Donald Trump has a disapproval rating of 52 or more now gets 281 electoral votes.

51 or higher? The Democrat wins 356 electoral votes.

50 or higher? 391 electoral votes.

48 or higher? 423 electoral votes (because Indiana and Alaska aren't on this chart).  

 

[pbrower2a]

Monmouth Poll, Virginia:

5. Do you approve or disapprove of the job Donald Trump is doing as president?

37%     Approve

57%     Disapprove

  6%     (VOL) Don't know

No need to alter the map.

https://www.monmouth.edu/polling-institute/reports/MonmouthPoll_VA_072417/

[pbrower2a]

Is it possible for a President who barely got elected in a State to lose it by double digits the next time? Sure. Think of Obama winning Indiana barely in 2008 only to lose it decisively in 2012. But Obama had plenty of breathing room in 2012.

I think of Carter losing Florida and Ohio in 1980 by double digits after winning them in 1976. For "Florida" you can substitute Pennsylvania and for "Ohio" you can substitute Michigan this time. Those two states look as if they will vote more like New York next time than be squeakers for Trump. By losing Michigan and Pennsylvania (and he is not going to get them back) Trump puts himself in the position of having to win everything else that he won in 2016. There are plenty of ways for him to lose. If he lost so much as the Second Congressional Districts of Maine and Nebraska he would lose 270-268 if he still held onto Wisconsin.

The only state that he lost in which his disapproval rate is at 50 or lower is Nevada... and that state is at 50. His barest win in 2016 (New Hampshire) gives him a 60% disapproval rate.  His second-barest loss gives him a 57% disapproval rate. Beyond that I see numbers from 55% to 71% (well, that is Vermont!)

But Trump does not have as much room for losses. He excited populist sentiments and then sold out the masses who voted for him. In the Midwest he is becoming a d@mnable city-slicker. In the South he is becoming a worse d@mnyankee than Barack Obama.  It is hard to see anyone heading in his direction unless he expects tax cuts or sweetheart deals.

[pbrower2a]

The only state that he lost in which his disapproval rate is at 50 or lower is Nevada... and that state is at 50. His barest win in 2016 (New Hampshire) gives him a 60% disapproval rate.

I don't know if I'm reading this wrong or not, but Trump did not win Nevada and New Hampshire.

But Trump does not have as much room for losses. He excited populist sentiments and then sold out the masses who voted for him. In the Midwest he is becoming a d@mnable city-slicker. In the South he is becoming a worse d@mnyankee than Barack Obama.  It is hard to see anyone heading in his direction unless he expects tax cuts or sweetheart deals.

Reminds me of what Fmr. Gov. Pat McCrory did. He campaigned as a pragmatist in his initial election in 2012, and did rather well for a Republican in North Carolina's urban areas. By 2016, he was trying to win reelection by banking on social conservatives with his bathroom bill, which was toxic in the state's urban centers. Only difference is that Trump is doing the opposite: he won with a huge turnout among rural voters, and is now banking on hard-line conservatives with the health care bill and yuge tax breaks for the top 1%.

The poll in question has New Hampshire disapproval at 51

Correction made. The poll that I am using for New Hampshire (by American Research Group) is from a later time than the Gallup compilation.  Basically just about any poll will replace any existing polling measure that I have for any state. It's not a swipe at Gallup; it's that the more recent poll is more likely to be reliable. I am treating the Gallup compilations as April polls.

So what am I not using? Favorability polls, polls from special interest groups (unless by well-recognized pollsters), push polls, or polls by suspect entities (like "Loof-Lipra Polling Institute" on April 1... get it?).

[pbrower2a]

Also from that poll, 49% of Trump supporters believe he won the popular vote.  40% believe Clinton won it.

And Trump voters wonder why everyone thinks they're ignorant

*puts on MAGA hat* He did win the popular vote; the millions of votes by illegals don't count!

Remove L.A. and NYC and what's the popular vote? I'd say those areas are not culturally representative of most of America.

The states elect the President; the People don't. That is an expression of federalism in 1787. Would America do that again if given a chance? After Donald Trump...

It's up to the people to recognize that a demagogue like Donald Trump can never achieve his contradictory promises, and even more the danger of voting for someone who showed a lack of a moral compass. We have put our precious democracy at risk.

We shall find out in 2020 unless the Democrats nominate someone similarly awful, in which case all bets are off.  

We also need remember that the policies of Donald Trump will hurt people just as much in a poor state like New Mexico that voted against him as in West Virginia, a poor state that voted for him.

[pbrower2a]

This thread is like the go-to place for upset liberals.

"Another conservative judge put on a Federal court...let me go see if Trump's dropped -1 in gallup..."

Gallup tracking polls are day-to-day events. They are full of statistical noise.

Sure, California is one of the most partisan states in America -- but did you ever see polls this bad for what you probably think the Antichrist of American politics (Barack Obama) get polls this low in Oklahoma or Wyoming?

Yes, even I can come up with a reason for President Trump doing unusually badly in California, which is that a larger share of Californians are renters than is the norm in America. If you are an owner-occupant of a house or condo, then Donald Trump does not remind you of the person as does a tenant who faces a rapacious landlord who disposes of a huge chunk of your income. Conservative politics thrived in the 1950s  (yes, in California  too) with so many suburban home-owners. But that is over. Long over.

Is the California result a freak? Maybe. I'm willing to see other polls come in to corroborate or refute the idea that President is about as popular as Jimmy Carter on the brink of electoral defeat.    

[pbrower2a]

PPIC - California:

Approve 25%
Disapprove 71%

Only 68% of California Republicans and 33% of Independents approve of Trump.

Source

california is real america, best america confirmed

I agree.

When I went there I saw so many Asians. Everyone always talks about Hispanics, or me it was Asians everywhere. That got me thinking, were they foreigners on vacation to Santa Monica, or were they California residents?

Respect for family and formal education, good work ethic, favorable attitude toward entrepreneurialism (if not Big Business) ... such is for winners, whatever their ethnicity or religion. California has a large Hispanic middle class, and it often seems to be taking cues from Asian-Americans than from some white subcultures that consider themselves superior for being white (if having no other real or imagined virtue, including 'whiteness' which is as dubious a virtue as there could be).

[pbrower2a]

I do see liberalism, socialism and globalism as significant threats. Trump's election was a very critical roadblock to holding back the collar of globalism which is extremely detrimental to America at it's finest.

The founding of the United States was an expression of the liberalism of the finest minds of the Enlightenment except for one thing: their acquiescence in slavery. Liberalism meant that government was responsible to the People, and the intellectual and moral currents of the time led to the inevitable abolition of a great blot on America. Lincoln would free the slaves in the name of a liberal philosophy. Industrialization would take place, and capitalists often held the idea that to get the fastest growth they would need the right to sweat workers as severely as possible to create the capital that underpins business. But working people decided that liberalism meant that they too were human and that they too had rights. Government responsible to the People would be responsible as much to toilers as to business owners. Governments expanded the franchise from property owners to men with nothing as well. The long heritage of female subordination to men from antiquity ensured that women would have no say in how their husbands spent the money. Men often got their paychecks, cashed them at a bar whose side rooms were gambling dens and whose upper floor was for all practical purposes a whorehouse, and left drunk and broke. Women would get the vote and support prohibition and the outlawry of most gambling. Maybe Prohibition went too far, but the clampdown on vice generally remained intact.  

Have there been repudiations of liberalism? Sure. Technically, Marxism-Leninism offered itself as  the definitive expression of liberal process. It degenerated quickly into fanaticism, a sham of democracy, and in the end despotism by a Party Boss. But liberals caught on. Fascism became the glorification of the Nation and the dominant people and the elevation of the Leader of the Movement to a god-like status, with any alternative view to be suppressed. Nazism -- if Mussolini was a vicious dog, then Hitler was a reckless tiger. The 1915 Klan? Fascism with a pretense of being American, but clearly for white Protestants only, at least as it was before it disintegrated and eventually died. But the arguments against Nazism, Fascism, and the thug order in Japan were liberal arguments. Liberals had something to fight for -- freedom -- that fascists did not have.

I can discuss our latest significant recognition of freedom in America, but that would take some time. The arguments against Saddam Hussein and ISIS are liberal arguments. There is nothing wrong with Islam that liberal democracy cannot correct, just as was so with the Buddhist-Shinto hybrid in Japan -- or our Judeo-Christian culture.  

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We love our country enough to want to reform it into something better. Liberalism is not a static ideology. I could easily make the case that I would have been better off  being born and raised in any of the countries in which I have ancestors living after about 1600 because the medical-care system would have caught the Asperger's that has crippled my life. That includes the UK, Ireland, France, Belgium, Switzerland, Denmark, Norway, and Germany.  That includes East Germany, where living conditions would have been more spartan and politics much more repressive.

The ideology of Donald Trump is the celebration of his personality and the interests of his class above all else... Donald Trump makes me wish that I were something other than an America because our freedoms are eroding and government is becoming more responsive to well-connected people instead of to people unlike him. The economic progress of our time has taken away some of the once-easy ways to make a living, namely the meeting of shortages. I trust our armed forces with my God-given human rights (or rights inherent in my humanity as in some formulations) more than I trust a narcissistic twerp with a despotic streak  and a disdain for anyone who voted against him or refuses to go along with him 100% all the time. The man on the $20 bill was responsible for the Trail of Tears. I do not need ancestry among First Peoples to see the Trail of Tears as an abomination. Second Amendment? Since Donald Trump became our dictator I have come to recognize that a mono[poly on the possession of firearms by one side of the political spectrum is a bad idea. (For protection, I'd rather have a Rottweiler or Doberman who makes my abode as dangerous to a burglar as the Sunderbans, a swamp infested with man-eating tigers.

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No, I was thinking of burning a Confederate flag, a hammer-and-sickle flag, a Nazi flag, and a Trump banner together while waving an American flag kept safely out of the flames.  

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America is much more than Donald Trump. I could accept self-proclaimed conservatives stating that America was much more than Barack Obama. So why can't you accept my assertion that Donald Trump is the worst thing to have happened to American politics since the 1915 Klan?

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It is unfortunate that you did not avail yourself better of the universal education that became an objective of liberal ideology.  

[pbrower2a]

Former President (and Governor of California about fifty years ago) Ronald Reagan must be rolling over in his grave.

PPIC - California:

Approve 25%
Disapprove 71%

Only 68% of California Republicans and 33% of Independents approve of Trump.

Source

neighboring Nevada (PPP):

PPP - Nevada:

42% Approve
53% Disapprove

Source

Heller's numbers are awful: 29/56

Donald Trump must remind many Californians of their landlords, arguably the least-beloved of entrepreneurs to middle-class people. But this may be the first statewide poll in the wake of the 'self-pardon' talk.  If this is not a fluke, then any new polls of such states as Connecticut, Illinois, Minnesota, New Jersey, New Mexico, Oregon, and Washington could be going into the 'deep red' category.

This "71" is so far the highest disapproval that I have seen of the President in any state, tying the Gallup composite from January to July in Vermont. I'm not sure that a current poll of Vermont would be any better for the President Trump. But Vermont gets polled little... three electoral votes and dull politics is less interesting than 55 electoral votes and dull politics.

For one of the usual battleground states, Nevada gets polled rather little. Remember: this poll is newer than a reasonable estimate of the Gallup composite that averages (as I understand) from April.  Most polls (barring favorability polls, polls by special interests, internal polls, and polls with the suspect "electric green fried potatoes" wording will supplant the Gallup composites which are older and of declining relevance. I am no longer using the excuse 'Beggars can't be choosers' to accept just about any poll. The Nevada poll is not a category-changer. It is still consistent with Trump losing about 3% support since April, which is still within the range of error.  

Nevada, although extremely urban, is a low-income state with lower-than-average educational achievement, so it should be more amenable to President Trump than such states as Colorado and Virginia. But Trump is doing badly in Nevada.    

Blue, positive and 40-43%  20% saturation
............................ 44-47%  40%
............................ 48-50%  50%
............................ 51-55%  70%
............................ 56%+     90%

Red, negative and  48-50%  20% (raw approval or favorability)
..........................  44-47%  30%
..........................  40-43%  50%
..........................  35-39%  70%
.......................under  35%  90%

White - tie.


Now for the theme of disapproval as shown in the Gallup data:

navy under 40
blue 40-43
light blue 44-47
white 48 or 49
pink 50-54
red 55-59
maroon 60 or higher

[pbrower2a]

Arizona at 47-52? That does not change my map.

With Michigan and Pennsylvania effectively gone for the President (promises made and promises betrayed, which is not good for getting re-elected), Democrats start with 268 solid electoral votes. He's not gaining in such states that he lost barely as Minnesota, Nevada, or New Hampshire, let alone Colorado or Virginia.

And, yes, I would still like to see up-to-date polls of Georgia and Ohio.

I don't know how solid the electoral vote of ME-02 is, but that alone would be enough to throw the Presidential election to the House of Representatives. Nebraska's Second Congressional District is a legitimate swing vote.

President Trump is not assured a loss, but he has plenty of ways to lose. ME-02 and NE-02; Arizona, Florida, North Carolina, Ohio, and Wisconsin. That makes six trouble spots scattered across America, different enough that the President cannot make a specific appeal that can win them all.  If you are wondering why I didn't mention  some other states...

he's not going to lose Georgia or Texas without also winning Florida; he's not going to lose Indiana without also winning Ohio; he's not going to lose Iowa without also losing Wisconsin.

[pbrower2a]

Arizona

https://www.bizjournals.com/phoenix/news/2017/07/27/arizona-polltrump-approval-at-47-support-for-gop.html

Arizona is not normally a swing state.

Fixed. Many people were surprised to see Virginia going to Obama in 2008.

[pbrower2a]

Arizona

https://www.bizjournals.com/phoenix/news/2017/07/27/arizona-polltrump-approval-at-47-support-for-gop.html

Arizona is not a swing state.

It hasn't been a real swing state -- but it was closer for Hillary Clinton in a close election than it was for Obama in two not-so-close elections.

See also Texas.

In any event,

I'd guess that disapproval of President Trump is over 80% in the District of Columbia. Assuming that the Congressional districts of Maine and Nebraska go as their states go at-large,  I can count electoral votes by disapproval rating based either upon the Gallup composite or a poll from May or later...

Listing the electoral votes available at levels of disapproval for the President from the lowest levels to the highest

EVB  DSR CHG   EVA   states
  
000   36   11     011    ND WV WY
006   39   16     027    AL OK
022   41   03     030    MT
030   42   21     051    ID KS TN
051   43   23     075    KY LA NE SD
075   44   09     084    SC
084   46   16     100    MO MS
100   47   06     106    AR
106   48   32     138    AK  IN OH
138   50   37     175    GA NC UT
175   51   77     252    FL TX  WI
252   52   17     269    AZ IA
269   53   06     275    NV
275   55   08     283    ME RI
270   56   15     298    DE NM OR
295   57   31     329    CO MN VA
317   58   34     363    IL NJ
347   59   24     387    CO HI WA
383   60   04     391    NH
387   61   16     407    MI
403   62   49     456    NY PA
456   64   10     466    MD
466   66   11     477    MA
477   71   58     535    CA VT
535   80   03     538    DC


EVB -- electoral votes for Trump  BEFORE winning the state(s)
DIS -- disapproval rating
CHG -- change in the number of electoral votes
EVA -- electoral votes for Trump AFTER winning states in this category
'80' is my guess for the District of Columbia.

This is how the states 'fall' if I  use disapproval ratings for the President to predict which states switch from an unnamed opponent to Donald Trump. He must win states in which his disapproval rating is 43% just to avoid a loss like those of Hoover in 1932 or Carter in 1980. For him to lose that badly he would have to lose even more credibility.

The elder Bush got only 168 electoral votes in 1992. He wasn't a really-awful President; he just couldn't convince people that he had any idea of what to do in a second term. To avoid losing that badly, President Trump would have to win some states in which 50% of the people disapprove of his performance. In a close election, Gerald Ford lost to Jimmy Carter with 30 electoral votes short of a win. He would need to win states in which his disapproval is now at 51%.

By winning every state in which his disapproval rating is 52% he would get a tie in the Electoral College. House delegations would then decide who wins unless the President can pick off the Second Congressional District of Maine.

To win roughly as Dubya did in 2004 (284 electoral votes) he would have to win states in which his disapproval rating is at 55%.

... To win re-election, President Trump must cut down the level of disapproval from the high fifties to the high forties, at the least. Being six months into the Presidency and having a disapproval level of 53% at the lowest in enough states to lose the election outright is better than being in the same position six months before the election, but that's like saying that being behind 10-0 in a baseball game after the second inning is better than being behind 14-4 going into the seventh inning. (For people who do not understand American baseball, a baseball fame is nine innings, and the average number of runs that a team scores is about 5).

If there is any possible analogy to 1980, it is that a Democrat will have the role of Ronald Reagan. It is far too early to suggest such a result, as it would require new failures of this President. Carter was at 65% approval nationwide approval at this time forty years ago, and much went wrong for him.  

I am in no position in which to predict what can and will go wrong for this President. But this said, most Americans who despise this President would be satisfied if he ends up losing as Ford did.

...but even this is a conservative assessment of the chances of Democrats winning the 2020 Presidential election. There are possible events that nobody wants to happen that would utterly disgrace this Administration. Many of the numbers are composites of Gallup polls split by states in numbers inadequate for reliable numbers for individual states then but adequate as a composite -- if one treats them as "late April" polls, for that is the average time in which they were taken. Such is so for about half the states.

It is easy to see how any Democratic nominee wins in 2020. The states in red have disapproval ratings of 55 or higher for President Trump, and any halfway-competent Democratic challenger of the President will have 263 electoral votes almost automatically (it would be 264, but one of the electoral votes is from Maine-02, which voted for President Trump and for which I have no data). Disapproval for President Trump is at 53%, so Nevada + ME-02 puts the election up to the House  vote... something that a Republican might not want to assume reliable in January 2020. Add NE-02 (the Nebraska district, largely Omaha) that went to Obama in 2008, and the Democrat wins the Presidency outright with 270 electoral votes.

But should President Trump somehow win Nevada...

there are just too many ways for Trump to lose to make a bet on him anything other than a long-shot. Iowa, in which Donald Trump is a disappointment despite his decisive win there, works much like Nevada. Iowa and Wisconsin usually vote in tandem, so much so that the last time that they did not vote together (2004) they both went by less than 10,000 votes for the winner in 2004. Because it will be less tricky to win Wisconsin outright than Iowa + ME-02 +NE-02, and it is hard to see any Democrat winning Iowa but not Wisconsin I am going to discuss Wisconsin as an independent event. The Democrat will win Florida before winning either Georgia or Texas; Ohio before winning Indiana or Missouri; or Arizona before winning Utah (which is more likely to go to an independent conservative than to a Democrat); or even Nevada and Iowa together... so I don't need to mention Georgia, Indiana, Iowa, Missouri, Texas, or Utah deciding the next election. The states that he barely lost except Nevada are basically gone, so he can forget New Hampshire, Minnesota, Maine, Colorado, and Virginia next time. I see Michigan and Pennsylvania both turning against him even faster than Indiana slipped away from Obama.  

But that leaves e(AZ), e(FL), e(NV+ME2+NE2), e(NC), e(OH), and e(WI) as chances for Trump winning any of the states or combinations that he must keep away from the Democrat. Those chances, or values, are practically what statisticians call 'independent events; such as coin tosses and rolls of dice. One multiplies those chances to get expected results on the whole. All chances are less than one, but even an 80% chance of winning every one of them gives him about a 12% chance of winning re-election.

Random chance is all that I can discuss now about the likelihood of the President being re-elected. Much can change, and we can only speculate on how that changes the prospects for the 2020 election. You can believe that people who dislike, let alone loathe, this President will be doing everything possible to grease the skids.  

[pbrower2a]

Gallup (July 29th)

Approve 38% (-1)
Disapprove 57% (+1)

It has been for a long time he's between 35-40 now right?

Yeah, he is hit his base core of conservative Republicans support who won't abandon him short of a recession and / or russiagate hitting impeachment level Watergate standards

In other words, the morons who don't care about the nation at all, but only about furthering their political party. If Trump was a Democrat pushing the same agenda, they would all bail just because of the D next to his name.

And yes, I'm referring to several posters here.

I am a partisan Democrat, but had Donald Trump been the Democratic nominee and adopted boilerplate liberalism as a cover for his ideology, then I would  have voted for any Republican except Ted Cruz (creepy and dishonest) over him. Donald Trump has said things that make me sick. If only Republicans had heeded Mitt Romney last year.

Then again, liberals can easily reject those who stiff contractors, encourage violence, or brag about grabbing women by their crotches. We liberals generally do not tolerate rogues supposedly on our side.

To liberals Donald Trump is an ethical monster. To many conservatives, President Trump is a political failure. 

I just wish that Republicans had heeded Mitt Romney. Everything that Romney said about Trump has proved true.

[pbrower2a]

I really only care about state polls, we desperately need more of them. Its ridiculous there has been like one poll of Pennsylvania since the election.

The States elect the President, and the People do not.

We have the Gallup composites for January to July, and they give a reasonable picture of how things were averaging in April in about thirty states. It's hard to see how the President could gain anywhere from April. The April composite is newer than very early polls in Arizona and Minnesota, among others.  We have a chaotic, corrupt Administration that is not solving its problems.  Any credible polls supplant the Gallup composites not because the Gallup composites are so much flawed as they are obsolete.

The 2020 Presidential election is nearly three years from starting. The only elections likely to matter are the Gubernatorial elections in several states (especially Florida, Maine, Michigan, Ohio, Pennsylvania, and Wisconsin) that may decide whether their states have honest elections and Democratic defenses of such Senate seats as they won in 2006 and 2012. The Democrats have about twenty possible nominees for President at this point.

Yes, I would like to see some more statewide polls. Who wouldn't?