Some of Trump's Early Actions Are Popular, Some Are Not
In the first 3 days of Trump v2.0, Donald Trump signed 26 XOs, 12 legally binding memoranda, and four presidential
proclamations. That breaks the record of nine actions, taken by Joe Biden. It is also more than Trump issued in the
first three months of Trump v1.0.
An important question is: How popular are these policies with the public? Fortunately, there has been
recent polling
on many of the issues (although not all of it this month).
Let's take a look:
Popular Actions
- Detaining Immigrants: The majority of Americans want to detain and later deport any
undocumented immigrant who has been accused of a crime, even before the trial. Almost 60% of voters want to deport any
immigrant charged with a crime. 30% want to deport all "illegal" immigrants, even if their only crime is
entering the country illegally. The Laken Riley Act, which Congress just passed, allows the government to detain undocumented
immigrants charged with even misdemeanors.
- Building the Wall: This XO instructs DHS to continue building a wall on the Mexican
border. Polling shows that 53% approve of the wall (including 41% who strongly approve of the wall) against 44% who
don't approve. This proposal has gained popularity over time. In 2016, 62% opposed it.
- Declaring an Emergency: By declaring an emergency at the border, Trump opened up new powers to
crack down on illegal immigration. A clear majority (55%) approve of the emergency declaration, while 39% oppose it.
- Using the Military at the Border: As a consequence of declaring the border situation to
be an emergency, Trump can now send federal troops there. He is planning to send 10,000 of them to reinforce the 19,000
Border Patrol agents. About 60% of Americans like this idea and only 24% oppose it.
- Reducing the Cost of Living: Almost everyone wants to ban inflation and lower the cost of
living. A full 85% of likely voters in 2024 said this was a top priority for them. Now that the XO has been signed,
everything is suddenly "cheaper." Good going, Mr. President.
- Declaring There Are Two Sexes: The two-gender XO is popular, with 65% agreeing and 34%
disagreeing and saying there are more than two genders. When asked if taxpayer money should be used to fund gender
reassignment surgery, people were against using taxpayer money, 59% to 30%. Note that the latter poll was by McLaughlin,
a Republican pollster working for a Republican sponsor. But the first one was by a neutral pollster.
Mixed Actions
- Drill, Baby, Drill: Trump wants to produce more fossil fuel. This wish may or may not be
related to the $450 million the fossil fuel companies donated to his campaign. The public is divided. In one poll,
Americans oppose more drilling 48%-46% and in another one they oppose it on federal lands 39%-35%
- Eliminating Electric Vehicle Subsidies: During the Biden administration, there were
subsidies available for people buying electric cars. Trump scrapped those and is planning to make it legal for
gasoline-powered cars to pollute the air more. In a June 2023 poll, 52% of registered voters favored subsidizing
electric cars and 48% oppose that. In July 2024, a small majority wanted to keep the subsidies or increase them. We
didn't see any crosstabs that indicate how billionaire CEOs of electric car companies feel about the matter.
- Killing DEI Programs: One of the XOs directs government agencies and federal contractors
to end all DEI programs. This is consistent with a Supreme Court ruling that race-conscious affirmative action is, in
fact, discrimination against disfavored races and is thus unconstitutional. This XO goes much further though, applying
it to the entire government. How people feel about this depends on the wording. In a poll earlier this month, when asked
if government hiring should stop being based on race and return to merit, 59% wanted to go back to a merit-only system
and 41% wanted to use race. However, in a poll from October ult. 52% said that a focus on increasing diversity, equity, and
inclusion at work is a good thing and 21% said it is a bad thing.
This spotlights something we have long known and discussed: The actual wording of poll questions is extremely important.
Unpopular Actions
- Banning Birthright Citizenship: Trump's XO to ban birthright citizenship is not only
unconstitutional, it is also unpopular. A poll earlier in January shows that 55% want to follow the Constitution and
have everyone (except diplomats' children) born on American soil automatically become an American. Meanwhile, 41% oppose
the Fourteenth Amendment. As far as we know, no pollster has asked how many people oppose the Thirteenth Amendment, but
we guess the number is substantial.
- The Pardons: Trump's blanket pardon of 1,500 people who have been indicted for crimes at
the Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021 (about 80% of whom had already been convicted) is not popular. In one recent poll, 57%
opposed it and in another 62% opposed it. Trump's base largely supports the pardons, but Democrats and independents do
not.
- Schedule F: In his first term, Trump basically repealed the 1883 Pendleton Act, which
created a merit-based civil service to replace Andrew Jackson's spoils system. Under the spoils system, the president gave civil service
jobs to his supporters. Joe Biden canceled Trump's XO. Now Trump has reinstated it and plans to fire up to 50,000 civil
servants and replace them with his flunkies. This is not popular, with 49% of Americans opposing replacing a merit-based
civil service with one staffed by presidential appointees and 28% supporting a patronage system. Another poll showed
that over 60% of Americans do not want the president to fire civil servants who disagree with the president's policies
or belong to the other party.
- Leaving the Paris Accord: In his first term, Donald Trump withdrew from the Paris Climate
Accord. Joe Biden joined again. Now Trump has withdrawn again. This action was not popular, with 52% opposed to
withdrawal and only 21% in favor. When Trump withdrew the first time, 62% of Americans opposed the withdrawal. Trump
clearly does not care what Americans want on this front.
We doubt that Trump really understands what is in the Accord, but he knows that withdrawing from it makes Democrats' blood boil and that is good enough.
- Saving TikTok: Congress passed a law banning TikTok if it didn't sell its American
operations to an American company by Jan. 19. It didn't. There was a provision in the law stating that the president
could give an extension if there was real progress on a sale. There has been no progress at all, but Trump extended the
deadline anyway, which violates the law. By a 2-to-1 margin (44% to 22%), people do not approve of the extension, but
many people are undecided or don't understand the matter at all. Americans over 45 want to ban TikTok but those 18-29
oppose the ban 43%-27%.
- Gulf of America: In an XO, Trump renamed the Gulf of Mexico, which has been called that
for 400 years, as the Gulf of America. That was a typo, of course, since he was thinking of the Golf of
America. It was not a popular move, with 72% opposing the name change and 28% supporting it.
All in all, most XOs relating to immigration are popular, but most of the others are mixed or unpopular. When
pollsters start breaking down popular/unpopular by partisanship, we are likely to see that almost everything Trump has
done is popular or mixed among his supporters with almost none of them unpopular. (V)
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