Job Ratings for Political Leaders Show Public's Disillusionment

Majorities give political parties in Congress negative job ratings

News provided by

Jul 07, 2010, 04:58 ET

NEW YORK, July 7 /PRNewswire/ -- Dissatisfaction with the state of the country continues to grow, as does some disenchantment with the President and Congress. Because of this, it is not surprising at all that Americans have negative opinions of how members of the Cabinet and other political leaders in Washington are performing.

(Logo: http://photos.prnewswire.com/prnh/20100517/NY06256LOGO)

(Logo: http://www.newscom.com/cgi-bin/prnh/20100517/NY06256LOGO)

Secretary of State Hillary Clinton is perceived as doing the best job. Just under half (45%) of Americans give her positive job ratings while one-third (35%) give her negative ones and one in five (19%) are not familiar enough with her to have an opinion. Not only does she have the highest positive ratings, Hillary Clinton is also the best known of these political figures.

These are some of the results of The Harris Poll of 2,227 adults surveyed online between June 14 and 21, 2010 by Harris Interactive.

These figures are somewhat reversed for Vice President Joe Biden as 45% of Americans have a negative view of his job performance. Just one-quarter (26%) have a positive view, while three in ten (29%) are not familiar with him.

Two other Cabinet members are on this list, but neither is well-known to the American public. Over half are not familiar (56%) with Defense Secretary Robert Gates, while 23% of Americans give him positive ratings and 20% negative marks on the job he is doing. Greater numbers are unfamiliar with Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner (61%), but only 10% of Americans give the job he is doing positive marks and three in ten (29%) give him negative ones.

Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke has definitely been in the news, yet over half of Americans (55%) say they are not familiar enough with him to have an opinion. Those who do have an opinion are more negative as three in ten Americans (29%) give the job he is doing negative marks while 17% give him positive marks. Supreme Court Chief Justice John Roberts has the public split, with one in five giving him positive ratings (18%) and 19% giving him negative ratings; however; almost two-thirds (64%) are not familiar with him.

Looking at Congress, half of Americans (49%) give Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi negative ratings while just one in five (20%) give her positive marks and 31% are not familiar with her. The political parties in Congress do the worst as over half of U.S. adults give both Democrats (54%) and Republicans (52%) negative overall job ratings. One in ten (11%) give Republicans positive ratings and 14% give Democrats positive ratings.

So what?

There seems to be enough disenchantment to spread around the political environs. People are unhappy, they need someone to blame and those in power are the ones feeling the heat at the moment. How this translates at the ballot boxes in November is still unknown. The next four months should be interesting to watch as politicians scramble for their political lives. There might be one bright spot for Republicans and Democrats in Congress – they are both at such low points in job approval, there might not be any place to go but up.

TABLE 1 FAMILIARITY OF SENIOR CABINET MEMBERS, CONGRESSIONAL LEADERS AND PARTIES IN CONGRESS "Are you familiar enough with each of the following to have an opinion regarding them?" Base: All adults
	FAMILIAR
	Mar.	April	May	June	Aug.	Sept.	Dec.	Jan.	Mar.	June
	%	%	%	%	%	%	%	%	%	%
Secretary of State Hillary Clinton	85	83	83	81	82	82	82	82	81	81
Vice President Joe Biden	70	67	69	68	71	70	72	67	72	71
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi	68	65	66	66	67	69	71	68	69	69
Democrats in Congress	66	64	64	65	68	69	67	71	68	68
Republicans in Congress	62	61	59	58	63	65	64	66	67	64
Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke	42	43	43	41	44	48	N/a	N/a	49	45
Defense Secretary Robert Gates	40	44	43	42	45	46	49	47	48	44
Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner	35	44	41	39	43	42	43	43	43	39
Chief Justice John Roberts	40	N/a	N/a	37	N/a	N/a	N/a	N/a	N/a	36
Note: N/a indicates not asked

TABLE 2 RATINGS OF SENIOR CABINET MEMBERS, CONGRESSIONAL LEADERS AND PARTIES IN CONGRESS "How would you rate the overall job each of the following is doing?" Base: All adults
	Positive*	Excellent	Pretty Good	Negative**	Only Fair	Poor	Not Familiar
	%	%	%	%	%	%	%
Secretary of State Hillary Clinton	45	12	33	35	21	14	19
Vice President Joe Biden	26	4	22	45	24	21	29
Defense Secretary Robert Gates	23	5	18	20	14	7	56
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi	20	4	16	49	14	36	31
Chief Justice John Roberts	18	4	14	19	10	8	64
Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke	17	3	14	29	17	11	55
Democrats in Congress	14	2	12	54	23	31	32
Republicans in Congress	11	1	10	52	24	29	36
Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner	10	1	9	29	14	15	61
Positive = excellent or pretty good *Negative = only fair or poor

TABLE 3 RATING OF VICE-PRESIDENT JOE BIDEN - TREND How would you rate the job Vice-President Joe Biden is doing?" Base: All adults
		Positive*	Negative**	Not Familiar
June '10	%	26	45	29
March	%	29	44	28
Jan.	%	28	39	33
Dec.	%	30	42	28
Sept.	%	30	41	30
Aug.	%	33	38	29
June	%	30	38	32
May	%	32	36	31
April	%	34	32	33
March	%	35	35	30
Excellent or pretty good. *Only fair or poor. Note: Percentages may not add up to 100% because of rounding.

TABLE 4 RATING OF SECRETARY OF STATE HILLARY CLINTON – TREND How would you rate the job Secretary of State Hillary Clinton is doing?" Base: All adults
		Positive*	Negative**	Not Familiar
June '10	%	45	35	19
March	%	48	33	19
Jan.	%	49	33	18
Dec.	%	48	34	18
Sept.	%	48	34	18
Aug.	%	51	31	18
June	%	47	34	19
May	%	50	33	17
April	%	51	32	17
March	%	49	36	15
Excellent or pretty good. *Only fair or poor. Note: Percentages may not add up to 100% because of rounding.

TABLE 5 RATING OF DEFENSE SECRETARY ROBERT GATES – TREND How would you rate the job Defense Secretary Robert Gates is doing?" Base: All adults
		Positive*	Negative**	Not Familiar
June '10	%	23	20	56
March	%	27	21	52
Jan.	%	26	21	53
Dec.	%	28	21	51
Sept.	%	28	18	54
Aug.	%	28	17	55
June	%	28	13	58
May	%	28	15	57
April	%	30	14	56
March	%	27	13	60
Excellent or pretty good. *Only fair or poor. Note: Percentages may not add up to 100% because of rounding.

TABLE 6 RATING OF TREASURY SECRETARY TIM GEITHNER – TREND How would you rate the job Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner is doing?" Base: All adults
		Positive*	Negative**	Not Familiar
June '10	%	10	29	61
March	%	13	30	57
Jan.	%	14	29	57
Dec.	%	15	29	57
Sept.	%	16	26	58
Aug.	%	17	26	57
June	%	15	24	61
May	%	16	26	59
April	%	18	26	56
March	%	11	24	65
Excellent or pretty good. *Only fair or poor. Note: Percentages may not add up to 100% because of rounding.

TABLE 7 RATING OF HOUSE SPEAKER NANCY PELOSI – TREND How would you rate the job House Speaker Nancy Pelosi is doing?" Base: All adults
		Positive*	Negative**	Not Familiar
June '10	%	20	49	31
March	%	16	52	31
Jan.	%	18	50	32
Dec.	%	22	49	29
Sept.	%	20	49	31
Aug.	%	19	48	33
June	%	18	49	34
May	%	21	45	34
April	%	21	44	35
March	%	23	45	32
Excellent or pretty good. *Only fair or poor. Note: Percentages may not add up to 100% because of rounding.

TABLE 8 RATING OF DEMOCRATS IN CONGRESS – TREND How would you rate the job the Democrats in Congress are doing?" Base: All adults
		Positive*	Negative**	Not Familiar
June '10	%	14	54	32
March	%	14	54	32
Jan.	%	17	54	29
Dec.	%	18	50	33
Sept.	%	18	51	31
Aug.	%	21	47	32
June	%	21	43	35
May	%	25	39	36
April	%	22	42	36
March	%	25	41	34
Excellent or pretty good. *Only fair or poor. Note: Percentages may not add up to 100% because of rounding.

TABLE 9 RATING OF REPUBLICANS IN CONGRESS – TREND How would you rate the job the Republicans in Congress are doing?" Base: All adults
		Positive*	Negative**	Not Familiar
June '10	%	11	52	36
March	%	16	51	33
Jan.	%	16	50	34
Dec.	%	14	50	36
Sept.	%	11	54	35
Aug.	%	12	52	37
June	%	12	46	42
May	%	14	45	41
April	%	14	48	39
March	%	15	47	38
Excellent or pretty good. *Only fair or poor. Note: Percentages may not add up to 100% because of rounding.

TABLE 10 RATING OF FEDERAL RESERVE CHAIRMAN BEN BERNANKE – TREND How would you rate the job Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke is doing?" Base: All adults
		Positive*	Negative**	Not Familiar
June '10	%	17	29	55
March	%	21	28	51
Sept.	%	25	23	52
Aug.	%	20	24	56
June	%	18	23	59
May	%	19	24	57
April	%	20	23	57
March	%	14	28	58
Excellent or pretty good. *Only fair or poor. Note: Percentages may not add up to 100% because of rounding

TABLE 11 RATING OF SUPREME COURT CHIEF JUSTICE JOHN ROBERTS – TREND How would you rate the job Chief Justice John Roberts is doing?" Base: All adults
		Positive*	Negative**	Not Familiar
June '10	%	18	19	64
June	%	21	15	63
March	%	25	16	60
Excellent or pretty good. *Only fair or poor. Note: Percentages may not add up to 100% because of rounding.

Methodology

This Harris Poll was conducted online within the United States June 14 to 21, 2010 among 2,227 adults (aged 18 and over). Figures for age, sex, race/ethnicity, education, region and household income were weighted where necessary to bring them into line with their actual proportions in the population. Propensity score weighting was also used to adjust for respondents' propensity to be online.

All sample surveys and polls, whether or not they use probability sampling, are subject to multiple sources of error which are most often not possible to quantify or estimate, including sampling error, coverage error, error associated with nonresponse, error associated with question wording and response options, and post-survey weighting and adjustments. Therefore, Harris Interactive avoids the words "margin of error" as they are misleading. All that can be calculated are different possible sampling errors with different probabilities for pure, unweighted, random samples with 100% response rates. These are only theoretical because no published polls come close to this ideal.

Respondents for this survey were selected from among those who have agreed to participate in Harris Interactive surveys. The data have been weighted to reflect the composition of the adult population. Because the sample is based on those who agreed to participate in the Harris Interactive panel, no estimates of theoretical sampling error can be calculated.

These statements conform to the principles of disclosure of the National Council on Public Polls.

The results of this Harris Poll may not be used in advertising, marketing or promotion without the prior written permission of Harris Interactive.

J38301

Q1220, 1225

The Harris Poll® #86, July 7, 2010

By Regina A. Corso, Director, The Harris Poll, Harris Interactive

About Harris Interactive

Harris Interactive is one of the world's leading custom market research firms, leveraging research, technology, and business acumen to transform relevant insight into actionable foresight. Known widely for the Harris Poll and for pioneering innovative research methodologies, Harris offers expertise in a wide range of industries including healthcare, technology, public affairs, energy, telecommunications, financial services, insurance, media, retail, restaurant, and consumer package goods. Serving clients in over 215 countries and territories through our North American, European, and Asian offices and a network of independent market research firms, Harris specializes in delivering research solutions that help us – and our clients – stay ahead of what's next. For more information, please visit www.harrisinteractive.com.

Press Contact:
Corporate Communications
Harris Interactive
212-539-9600
[email protected]

SOURCE Harris Interactive

News Releases view all

Browse News Releases

News Releases Overview

Multimedia Gallery

Multimedia Gallery Overview

Trending Topics

News Releases

Job Ratings for Political Leaders Show Public's Disillusionment

News provided by

Contact PR Newswire

Products

About

My Services