28% of 1,709 U.S. adults in Yahoo/YouGov poll say Trump has been a better president than they expected. USA! USA! 28%!

[Miles Archer]

The survey of 1,709 U.S. adults was conducted from Jan. 8 to 12, right after Trump toppled Venezuelan leader Nicolás Maduro, threatened to forcibly take Greenland from Denmark and mused about using the Insurrection Act against anti-ICE protesters in Minneapolis — and right before he and his team celebrated “One Year of MAGA” with a series of posts on social media.

“One year ago, everything changed,” the official White House account wrote on X. “The return of strength. The return of America First. The era of winning is here — and it’s just getting started.”

*****

For many Americans, Trump’s performance is increasingly falling short of expectations. After his first year back in office, just 28% say he has been a better president than they expected. More than twice as many (49%) say he has been worse. (Another 20% say he has been “about the same” as they expected.)

That gap between worse and better — now 21 percentage points — has doubled since last March. Back then, 41% of Americans said Trump had performed worse than they expected; 30% said better.

https://www.yahoo.com/news/politics/article/its-been-1-year-of-trumps-second-term-more-americans-than-ever-think-hes-changing-america-for-the-worse-195730496.html

[Irish_Dem]

1. May God have mercy on our souls.

If Americans have any souls at this point.

[Johonny]

2. 28 percent is not great

Your basically into Bigfoot and UFO territory. Those 28 percent probably have no idea what he actually has done.

[kimbutgar]

3. I have a brother in law who is one of those 28%

And on Facebook I just got attacked by one.

[Turbineguy]

4. We haven't been annihilated in a nuclear holocaust

so yeah, better than expected.

[Boo1]

5. Not very useful

I'd rather they just give approval/disapproval. Better/same/worse is really dependent on your starting point, which we don't know.

How many of the "about what I expected" expected that he's be terrible? How many of the "better than expected" thought we'd all be in a dystopian hellscape by now?

[Emile]

6. 28% diehard magats all voting for the Magic R,

and ignoring what's going on.

[mn9driver]

7. Slightly more than 1 in every four Americans

Are stone cold racist, misogynist assholes.

[Miles Archer]

9. This won't make that any better, but...

...Trump's singular "accomplishment"...if we want to call it that...was identifying those people, knowing they had rightfully been pushed to the margins of society, knowing they resented it, knowing they felt powerless against it...

...and knowing he could mobilize them, monetize them, pick their pockets, and...by sending them the message they wanted to hear...they would empower his entry into a political career. They'd ELECT him.

He knew that 8 years of a Black man in the White House made these people NUTS. It was one of their worst nightmares come true. After all, their world...their reality...consisted of "Whites Only" lunch counters and drinking fountains and Black people riding ONLY at the back of the bus.

So...enter the Obama "Birther" racist conspiracy theory.

See, it NEVER MATTERED whether Trump could "prove" it or not. And obviously, he couldn't, because it was all a manufactured lie.

But it stirred up the resentment and anger and bigotry that permeated all 8 years of Obama's presidency.

Trump didn't "create" these people. They were the equivalent of a terrorist "sleeper cell," waiting for their "wake up call," and that call came from Trump.

And because he's the ONLY person with a public "megaphone" and a big mouth to yell into it who told these people "I UNDERSTAND how and why you feel that way, and you're RIGHT to feel that way," they decided he was, in fact, Jesus Christ, returned to Earth to walk among us again in human form.

So YES...1/4 of the country loves what Trump sells, and how he's selling it. He didn't create these people. They were here BEFORE his political career, and they will be here AFTER it. People like JD Vance and Stephen Miller will attempt to "give them oxygen" and "keep the MAGAt movement going," and I'm not convinced anyone can do that. I think that EVEN THOUGH IT WILL NOT HAPPEN OVERNIGHT, when TRUMP is gone, THEY will slither back into the shadows.

[FascismIsDeath]

8. Not surprising. That is inline with just about anyone's floor.... regardless of how bad they are.

[fargone]

10. 49% is not more than twice as many as 28%

[struggle4progress]

11. Translatiuon: 83% say Trump is an even bigger asshole than they expected, but only 34% are happy about it,

while it depresses 49%