Gallup ends 88 years of presidential approval polling amid Trump attacks

George Gallup founded the American Institute of Public Opinion in 1935 and began experimenting with presidential approval measurements during Franklin D

Roosevelt's administration

He developed the modern approval question during the 1930s, testing multiple wordings before settling on the version still used today By the time Harry Truman became president in 1945, the question had become standardized across polling firms The final wording reads: Do you approve or disapprove of the way [president's name] is handling his job as president Gallup called presidential approval probably the most frequently asked question in polling history.

The firm built its reputation by correctly predicting FDR's 1936 reelection victory when The Literary Digest poll predicted his opponent would win

Gallup used scientific sampling methods, choosing representative samples that didn't need to be large but had to reflect the full population including different economic classes and demographics

The Literary Digest had sent millions of mail ballots to telephone subscribers and car owners, missing working-class voters who couldn't afford phones or cars After Gallup's correct prediction, The Literary Digest folded within two years Gallup's success established scientific polling as the standard for measuring public opinion.

Presidential approval ratings have ranged from Harry Truman's low of 22% in February 1952 during the Korean War to George H.W

Bush's high of 89% in February 1991 during the Gulf War

Dwight Eisenhower holds the record for highest average approval at 61% across his two terms Donald Trump ended his first term with the lowest average approval rating in Gallup's history since Truman The approval measure has proven highly predictive of electoral outcomes Presidents with approval ratings below 50% in the months before Election Day typically lose reelection bids Gerald Ford and Jimmy Carter both had first-term averages below 50% and lost their reelection campaigns.

Gallup's final presidential approval poll was released in December 2025

It found Trump at 36% approval and 59% disapproval

This matched November's rating as his lowest of his second term His approval had peaked at 47% in February 2025, one month after taking office, then dropped 11 percentage points over 10 months The same December poll found that only 17% of respondents approved of Congress's job performance Gallup had been conducting approval polls continuously through telephone surveys, though the firm noted that telephone-based polling had become less common as more firms moved to online methods.

The firm stopped conducting horse-race election polling in 2015, citing high costs and declining response rates for pre-election surveys

Gallup explained at the time that it would focus on understanding Americans' opinions on issues rather than predicting election winners

The Feb. 11, 2026 announcement extends that earlier shift away from political forecasting to now include approval and favorability ratings as well JMJustin McCarthy, Gallup's spokesperson, told multiple outlets the decision was part of a broader ongoing effort to align all of Gallup's public work with its mission of providing analytics that inform and drive meaningful change.

Trump has repeatedly threatened and sued polling firms over unfavorable results

In December 2024, he sued 🌽Iowa pollster ASAnn Selzer and The Des Moines Register under Iowa's Consumer Fraud Act after Selzer's final pre-election poll showed Harris leading by 3 percentage points in Iowa

Trump won the state by 13 points He claimed the poll was fraud and election interference The Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression is defending Selzer, calling the lawsuit a SLAPP suit designed to punish protected political speech Trump also threatened The 🗽New York Times over polls showing low approval ratings He wrote on social media that fake and fraudulent polling should be virtually a criminal offense A conservative group called the Center for American Rights filed a separate class-action lawsuit against Selzer seeking $2.8 million in damages on behalf of Register subscribers.

Other major polling firms continue to measure presidential approval despite Gallup's exit

Morning Consult conducts daily approval tracking with a seven-day rolling average

Harvard-Harris runs monthly approval surveys The Economist partners with YouGov for weekly presidential approval tracking Pew Research Center conducts quarterly approval polls These firms provide ongoing measurement of presidential job performance using different methodologies FiveThirtyEight aggregates approval polls from multiple sources into a single tracker that weights polls by their historical accuracy and sample size The aggregated approach reduces the impact of any single firm's methodology or potential bias.