Biden Approval Ratings in Decline

Americans are voicing their disapproval of President Joe Biden, nearly nine months after he took office.

In a string of national polls in the last week, an aggregate of 49.2% of voters surveyed disapproved of Biden’s handling of the presidency, while 44.5% approved, according to the FiveThirtyEight polling site. Five of the recent polls registered disapproval of the country’s 46th president at the RealClearPolitics site, with three favorable.

Analysts say the drop in Biden’s standing has been particularly precipitous among independent voters who helped him win the White House last year over then-President Donald Trump.

In July, at the six-month mark of his presidency, Biden enjoyed a nine-percentage point favorability edge, but by the end of August, polls showed U.S. voters were evenly divided in their views about him.

His standing has dropped more since then, with political analysts offering several explanations.

It was a time coinciding with the chaotic U.S. military withdrawal from Afghanistan after 20 years of warfare, the analysts say. They also cite political rancor in Washington between Republicans and Democrats about increasing the government’s debt ceiling and between progressive and moderate Democratic lawmakers about the size and scope of a plan Biden has proposed for the biggest expansion of the country’s social safety net in more thaen five decades.