(The Lion) — President Trump scored above 50% favorability in the latest public opinion polling for the second month in a row following his November presidential victory.
“President-elect Trump held steady over the last month with a 51% favorable rating,” reported Emerson College Polling.
Last month, Trump’s favorability came in at 54%, said Emerson.
The high scores are not just a one-off from a random pollster.
An average of polls scored by RealClearPolitics shows Trump with an all-time high average of 49.4% favorable.
By contrast, the last time he was elected president, in 2016, Trump had a favorability rating of 37.5%, according to RealClear averages.
That was down significantly from 1999, when he first came on the scene politically, though he debuted well under 50%.
“Back in September 1999, when Trump first began talking about running for president, he had a negative favorability rating, with 47 percent of Americans having a negative opinion of him, compared to 41 percent who had a positive opinion,” said the National Review.
Trump himself seems to have noticed a difference in people’s attitudes towards him.
Confirming to the press yesterday that he recently had dinner with Apple’s CEO Tim Cook, Trump acknowledged that this time around people are actively courting him as president, whereas in 2016 people fought him.
“I had dinner with sort of almost all of them, and the rest are coming,” said Trump of the big technology magnates, including Cook. “And this is one of the big differences, one of the big differences between the first term and this term, everybody was fighting me in the first term, now everybody wants to be my friend.”
That’s consistent with Trump’s experience attending the reopening of Notre Dame Cathedral in Paris earlier this month.
Trump took central stage at the reopening, as the de facto president of the United States.
In addition to attending the Notre Dame celebration, Trump held peace talks in Paris with Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelensky and French President Emmanuel Macron, setting terms for an end to the Russia-Ukraine war in Europe, as reported previously by The Lion.
In addition, Trump was courted by Macron’s wife, the First Lady of France, chatted amiably with the current First Lady, Jill Biden, and wowed the future king of England, Prince William.
“I also met with William. And I was very impressed by William. I think William is terrific,” Trump told the press in his one-hour press conference at Mar-a-Lago.
The Emerson poll result also aligns with a survey that shows the American people approve of the way Trump is handling the transition back to the White House.
According to a Morning Consult poll, 54% of voters approve the way Trump is handling the transition.
The numbers of Americans who approve Trump’s current nominations to the cabinet outweighs those who disapprove, said the survey.
By contrast, President Joe Biden is approaching his all-time ratings low, with 56% of those surveyed noting they disapprove of his job performance, according to RealClearPolitics.
