AP poll shows Obama approval at 53%

In the latest poll from the Associated Press, Barack Obama gained six points to regain majority approval for the first time in months.  Republicans in Congress also gained ground, but so did Democrats, who now lead the GOP for trust on the economy.  It’s part of a mixed-bag result for the survey of general-population adults:

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Americans give higher marks to President Barack Obama and congressional Republicans after a holiday season of compromise paid dividends for both, according to the latest AssociatedPress-GfK poll.

At the start of the divided government era, the survey found that 53 percent of Americans approve of how Obama is doing his job, his best numbers since the divisive health care vote 10 months ago. …

Republicans in Congress got a slight bump, too, though they are not nearly as popular as Obama. Now, 36 percent give them high marks, compared with 29 percent last fall. But the increase was driven entirely by people who identify themselves as Republicans. Support among independents did not change.

On the question of whether Obama and Republicans can work in a bipartisan manner to solve what ails the country, 48 percent express some degree of optimism and 52 percent express some level of pessimism. It’s an improvement from just after the elections, when 41 percent were confident and 58 percent were not.

The sample in this poll is a little odd.  The AP’s data shows a D/R/I of 42/36/6, with 16% claiming they don’t know their party affiliation, which is very odd, especially with the choices provided in the survey — independent, and independent leaner to either party.  The AP counts the independent-leaners with the parties; when broken out as independents, the D/R/I changes to 28/25/31, with the other 16% still separate.  The 3-point Democratic edge might make sense in the general population, although Gallup and Rasmussen surveys both show the GOP with leads in the same sample type.

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Otherwise, not much has changed.  The right/wrong direction split, 37/57, is within the margin of error from before the election (38/59).    People are as happy as they were at that time, 39/39 now and 38/42 then.  Obama’s approval numbers have changed significantly, from 49/50 at the midterms among the general population to 53/46 now.

Congress has improved slightly less fron a 23/75 to a 26/69, which may mean that the lame-duck session helped both.  If so, it helped Republicans more than Democrats.  They improved from 29/69 to 36/61, while Democrats went from 36/62 to 29/60 — making the two parties almost identical in approval.

Unfortunately for Obama, he’s still underwater on the key issues.  On the economy, his approval rating is now 47/53, only up slightly from 43/55.  He’s unchanged on the deficit at 39/60, from 40/59 at the midterms.  That will make it very difficult for Obama to fight the coming Republican cuts to the budget, and pose a big risk for him in the next election if the GOP succeeds at it.

He does have one other bright spot, though: health care.  Even with the coming repeal on the table, his numbers have almost reversed themselves from 47/53 at the midterms to 51/49 now.  It’s not much, but it may give Obama some sense of security as he defends his signature legislation in this session of Congress.

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