Poll: Trump faces early challenges on the economy as a united GOP backs big change

Contributing sentiments towards policy:

65% : A new NBC News poll shows Trump with a job approval rating as high as he's ever had.
54% : " McInturff noted how Trump has fortified his base over the last year.
51% : Voters like the general idea of the Department of Government Efficiency, the Trump-blessed effort to slash government jobs and spending.
49% : Forty-six percent of voters say establishing a Department of Government Efficiency was a good idea, while 40% say it was a bad idea and another 13% do not have an opinion.
48% : Underscoring the deep partisan divide, Trump has the largest gap of any president in the last 80 years between his approval rating among members of his own party (90%) and his approval rating from the opposing party (4%), according to an analysis of three decades of NBC News polling and earlier data from Gallup.
45% : It's a new development for Trump, who never previously had a majority against his handling of the economy in a national NBC News poll.
42% : The split between how voters see his delivery on immigration and on economic issues comes after Trump identified them as the twin pillars of his 2024 victory, telling NBC News' "Meet the Press" in December: "I won on the border and I won on groceries.
40% : And voters are split evenly on which party they'd like to see win the 2026 midterm elections, even as the Democratic Party faces record-low popularity and fractious divides over how to respond to Trump.
40% : But that's the only one of the five issues tested in the poll -- border security and immigration, foreign policy, the economy, inflation and cost of living, and the war between Russia and Ukraine -- that sees a majority of American voters approve of how Trump is handling it.
38% : By comparison, 50% say congressional Democrats are too critical of Trump, 16% say they are too supportive of him and 30% say they are dealing with him in the right way.
37% : A near-majority, 49%, say that CEOs of large corporations are too supportive of Trump, 29% believe they are dealing with him correctly and 12% believe they are being too critical.
36% : A plurality, 44%, believe the Supreme Court is dealing with Trump in the right way, while 35% believe it's been too supportive and 14% believe it's been too critical.
35% : Asked to gauge their satisfaction about how much Trump is doing to battle inflation, a majority say they aren't satisfied -- 46% say they are "not at all satisfied" and another 9% say they are "not too satisfied," while 20% are "somewhat" satisfied and 23% are "very" satisfied.
35% : The NBC News poll also gauged voters' feelings on what kind of change Trump is bringing as president, with 40% saying he's bringing the right kind of change to inflation and the cost of living, while 30% say he's bringing the wrong change and 28% say he isn't bringing change.
34% : "While this survey shows a mixed result for Donald Trump, Democrats are the ones in the wilderness right now," said Democratic pollster Jeff Horwitt of Hart Research Associates, who conducted this survey with Republican pollster Bill McInturff of Public Opinion Strategies.
32% : Buoyed by jubilant and unified Republicans, who are standing in lockstep with Trump and the expansive agenda he and congressional leaders are pushing in Washington, more registered voters see the U.S. as heading in the right direction than at any point since early 2004, though a majority still say the country is on the wrong track.
25% : Trump also faces questions from voters about whether he is sufficiently focused on their core issue of costs as he pursues other projects like reshaping the federal bureaucracy.
22% : Meanwhile, 65% of Democrats say they want Democratic lawmakers to stick to their positions even if this means not being able to get things done in Washington, while 32% want them to compromise with Trump to gain consensus on legislation.
20% : And when it comes to the news media, 46% of voters say it has been too critical of Trump, 25% say it's been too supportive, and 24% say it's been dealing with Trump the right way.
18% : Overall, 46% said Trump is bringing the right kind of change, 30% said he's bringing the wrong kind of change, and 21% said he's not bringing change.
9% : As Trump dominates Washington, 53% of registered voters say Republicans in Congress are too supportive of the president, 6% say they are too critical and 39% say they are dealing with Trump in the right way.

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