Trump is losing support from Independents over Iran

A majority of Americans continue to disapprove of how Donald Trump is doing his job as president, in line with trends from the past few months. In this week's Economist / YouGov Poll, 37% of Americans strongly or somewhat approve of Trump's job handling, while 56% disapprove — a net job approval of -18 after rounding. The last time a three-week average of Trump's net job approval was higher than -15 was September 2025.

More Americans disapprove than approve of how Trump is handling all seven issues asked about on this week's poll. Trump gets the highest net approval for his handling of crime: 43% approve and 47% disapprove, for a net approval of -4. On each of crime, immigration, and the military, more Americans approve of how Trump is handling each of those issues than approve of his overall job performance. Approval of his handling of each of the environment, race relations, the situation in Iran, and investigations into Jeffrey Epstein is lower than Trump's overall approval.

Trump's net approval of -20 for handling the situation in Iran represents a drop from last week's poll. Then, 39% of Americans approved of how Trump was handling Iran and 52% disapproved — a net approval of -13.

The decline in approval of Trump's handling of Iran is almost entirely among Independents. Almost all Democrats disapprove of how Trump is handling Iran, and almost all Republicans approve; neither number changed much from week to week. But opinion among Independents of how Trump's handling Iran fell to 24% approve / 63% disapprove (-39 net) this week from 30% approve / 53% disapprove last week (-23 net).

Independents also have a worsening outlook about the effect of U.S. military intervention on Iran. 50% of them expect the intervention to worsen the situation in Iran and only 18% expect an improvement. A week earlier, 40% of Independents expected the intervention to make things worse and 24% expected it to make things better. Unlike with Trump's handling of Iran, in this case Democratic and Republican opinion also has gotten worse, though not by as much as among Independents. 72% of Democrats expect things to get worse because of the intervention, up from 64% last week. And 55% of Republicans expect improvement, down from 64% last week.

Other opinions show the extent of opposition to conflict with Iran and doubts about its success. Only 33% of Americans strongly or somewhat support the war with Iran, while 56% oppose it. 61% want to prioritize ending the war as quickly as possible while only 24% would prioritize continuing to fight until all U.S. objectives have been achieved. Only 32% are confident in Trump’s ability to deal wisely with an international crisis, while 56% are uneasy about his approach. And 46% think the U.S. is responsible for the February 28 missile strike on a girls’ elementary school in southern Iran that killed about 165 people, while only 17% say the U.S. isn't responsible; 37% aren't sure.

— Carl Bialik contributed to this article

Image: Getty (Majid Saeedi / Stringer)

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