President Donald Trump is facing political headwinds as he prepares to deliver the State of the Union Tuesday night, his first since returning to office for a second term.
While the 47th president of the United States will almost certainly present a nation that is booming, new data from CNN shows an overwhelming majority have negative views of his presidency.
According to the CNN poll conducted by SSRS, only 32% of Americans say Trump has had the right priorities as president, and 68% say he hasn’t paid enough attention to the country’s most pressing problems. Additionally, 61% of Americans say Trump’s policies will move the country in the wrong direction rather than the right one.
Comparable to several other polls, the new CNN survey also shows Trump’s job approval rating remains incredibly low at just 36%.
Among Black Americans, Trump’s approval rating is even lower. Only 21% of Black Americans approve of the president’s job performance, a decrease from 28% when he returned to office in January 2025.
If recent statements from the president and the White House are any indication, Trump will likely tout a U.S. economy that is prosperous, citing slight decreases in recent inflation and unemployment data. However, the devil is in the details.
While unemployment slightly dipped to 4.3% in January from December, it remains higher than when he took office, and there are more people seeking employment in today’s job market than there are actual jobs. For Black Americans, the unemployment rate remains significantly higher than the national rate (4.3%) at 7.2%.
And while the U.S. Supreme Court’s recent ruling against Trump’s global tariffs program was seen as a major victory for consumers and businesses who had been hit with higher prices for various goods and services, the president’s vow to impose another 15% tariffs on imported goods stands to create more economic pain.
The Trump administration’s immigration policies have also been met with broad condemnation. In another poll conducted by The Washington Post-ABC News-Ipsos, 58% of Americans disapprove of the way Trump is handling immigration, one of the president’s signature issues. The White House has taken heat over the president’s ICE operations in cities across the country, most notably in Minneapolis, where two U.S. citizens were fatally shot by federal officers and countless others reported various abuses.
“The concept of American exceptionalism shields many from the reality our country is facing right now, but we must be clear: Trump’s governance is an act of authoritarianism and any response that doesn’t acknowledge that truth is a disservice to Americans who deserve honesty right now,” said U.S. Rep. Summer Lee, D-Pa., who is boycotting the SOTU and will deliver the progressive response to Trump’s address on behalf of the Working Families Party.
“The state of our union is reflected in the affordability crisis working families are facing, the terror ICE is instilling upon our communities, and the division sowed between us. The Republican-led Congress has abdicated its post as a co-equal branch and yielded itself to the executive branch, so it’s time the people make their voices heard once again. The power of the people will always be greater than the people in power.”
Democratic strategist Ameshia Cross tells theGrio, “The greatest thing I think is going to come out of this State of the Union for Democrats is that Trump is going to be himself.”
She explained, “He is going to double down on tariffs, even though we know that that was a tax on the American consumer, even though the Supreme Court basically ruled that it was illegal to go through the tariff process that he did without having congressional authority to do so.”
Cross continued, “In addition to that, we’re going to hear him continue to deny that affordability is a crisis, and he is going to try to justify the overzealous acts of ICE agents across this country, up to one, including the American citizens who died at their hands.”
The Democratic strategist said all Democrats have to do is “remind Americans of who’s in office and who’s to blame for their prices going up, who’s to blame for their streets being militarized, who’s to blame for the bloodshed of American citizens in this country, and who’s to blame for creating wars here today and everywhere without paying attention to the needs of the people back home.”
