Trump’s approval rating surges amid impeachment inquiry

FILE: President of the United States Donald Trump speaking at the 2017 Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) in National Harbor, Maryland. (Photo: Gage Skidmore/Flickr, CC BY-SA 2.0)

ANKARA — US President Donald Trump’s job approval ratings have surged to nearly an all-time high ahead of pending Senate impeachment trial.

In the most recent Gallup poll released on Monday, 44 percent of Americans said they approve the job he is doing as president, nearly 5 percent above the 39-41 percent ratings he received as the Democrat-led impeachment proceedings started in the fall.

At the height of his popularity during his presidency, Trump enjoyed approval ratings around 46 percent, and on average he was never below 40 percent.

According to the poll, 88 percent of the Republicans, 37 percent of independents and 10 percent of Democrats approve of the job Trump is doing, which shows the impeachment inquiry has not had a negative effect on the administration’s popularity.

Conducted on Jan. 2-15, the poll highlighted that 46 percent of Americans say they would like their senators to vote to convict Trump and remove him from office, while 51 percent want their senators to vote against the conviction.

It also revealed that the popular approach to Trump’s impeachment is sharply divided along partisan lines.

The poll said 93 percent of Republicans reject convicting Trump and 84 percent of Democrats back it. Independents are evenly divided, with 49 percent in favor and 46 percent opposed.

The Senate’s impeachment trial of President Trump began Thursday with the reading aloud of the two House of Representatives-passed charges, making Trump the third chief executive in US history to face Senate proceedings. The two articles of impeachment against Trump — abuse of power and obstruction of Congress — related to his repeated effort to have Ukraine declare criminal investigations into leading Democratic candidate Joe Biden, and his subsequent refusal to cooperate with the House’s investigation of the matter.

Trump also directed his top officials to follow suit as the House continued to issue subpoenas that Democrats maintain would have brought to light information vital to their case.

Trump and his Republican allies in Congress have denied any sort of wrongdoing that took place, maintaining the president was working to ferret out corruption in Ukraine, not looking for influencing this year’s presidential election. (Anadolu)