Americans believe that the government, the political system, and the economy are not working for them... and they don’t think Donald Trump’s administration is going to make things better.
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Americans are disillusioned. On the eve of Donald Trump’s second inauguration, they believe that the political system has been broken for decades, that the government is wasteful and mainly benefiting itself and the elites, that the economic system favors the rich, and that the incoming administration will make things worse for them personally.
But that’s not all. According to a New York Times poll, they also think too much of their money is going to Ukraine and Israel, and that the US is too active on the global stage.
And Americans are skeptical that Donald Trump can fix things.
While Republicans are overwhelmingly convinced that the incoming president’s policies will benefit the economy and them personally, Democrats (strongly) and independents (noticeably) believe the opposite.
Overall, they are more inclined to view Trump’s second term with trepidation.
Before he takes the oath of office Monday, they are nearly split (47 percent to 51 percent) over whether they have positive or negative feelings about that. However, significantly more Americans are worried (37 percent) than excited (21 percent).
They don’t like his nominees or some of the signature policies that Trump wants to implement, such as tariffs or the reversal of birthright citizenship.
However, the poll also found that Americans want to give his mass deportation plan a try. Sixty-three percent of them support the deportation of immigrants who came to the US during the last four years and are in the country illegally.
It is no surprise that Republicans feel most strongly about that, but a surprising large percentage of Democrats (44 percent) also agree.
While GOP voters generally support everything Trump says and wants to do, there is one notable exception: Even they don’t want the incoming president to use the government to investigate and prosecute his political opponents.
Overall, 73 percent of Americans feel that way, including 58 percent of Republicans.
The poll is a sobering reminder that Americans are deeply unhappy with the current political and economic systems.
Nearly three-quarters of them believe that the government is mainly benefiting Trump and the elites, and 68 percent think that the economic system “unfairly favors the wealthy.”
This disenchantment has been a long time coming.
An astonishing 88 percent of Americans said the nation’s political system is broken. The numbers are nearly identical for Democrats and Republicans. They also agree that this is not a new development, with almost 60 percent saying that it has been broken for decades.
It seems unlikely that Trump of all people is going to restore their confidence in the government, the economic system, and politics.
All of that being said, Americans are surprisingly content on a personal level.
In what was perhaps the poll’s most curious finding, 82 percent of respondents said they are satisfied with the way things are going in their own lives.
