Majority of Americans Give Biden's First Year in Office a Brutal Grade in New Poll

By Abby Liebing February 26, 2022 at 8:55am

Joe Biden has been president for a little over a year. But his first year in office has been rocky, and Americans have not been pleased.

In a new poll from NPR/PBS NewsHour and Marist, 56 percent of those surveyed said Biden’s first year was a failure. Only 39 percent said it was a success.

A whopping 66 percent of Independent respondents said his first year was a failure.

A majority of respondents also said Biden is not fulfilling his campaign promises. Fifty-four percent said this is the case, while 52 percent said Biden actually has done more to divide the country than bring it together.

Biden has only a 39 percent approval rating overall, according to the poll.

“These are sort of rock-bottom numbers,” said Lee Miringoff, director of the Marist Institute for Public Opinion, which conducted the poll. “It’s about as low as you’re going to see him [Biden].”

Entering his presidency, the greatest things facing Biden were the pandemic and the economy.

“His administration got inflation completely wrong, and a good deal about the pandemic wrong, too,” Larry Sabato, director of the University of Virginia’s Center for Politics, told MarketWatch in late January.

But other issues also arose in the past year.

Will inflation rates drop at any time during Biden's presidency?

From COVID to inflation, the supply chain crisis, the United States’ chaotic withdrawal from Afghanistan, and now Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, the Biden administration seemingly has been in crisis mode for an entire year.

“On inflation, Afghanistan and the pandemic, I think he’s failed, and this is responsible for his political dilemma,” Matthew Continetti, a resident fellow at the American Enterprise Institute, told MarketWatch.

Though Biden has committed plenty of other blunders, the poll highlighted that Americans are most concerned with rising inflation and the economy, the Marist Poll‘s reporting highlighted.

Thirty-eight percent said they think Biden’s top priority now should be inflation. Twenty-nine percent also said their family finances have gotten worse in the past year. Only 23 percent said their finances have improved, and 48 percent said they have been about the same.

The numbers also showed that many Americans are not optimistic about their finances improving. Twenty-two percent predict their finances will get worse, and 41 percent think they will remain the same.

Personal finances, of course, are impacted by inflation. In January, U.S. inflation hit 7.5 percent, a level not seen in 40 years, Trading Economics reported.

This has hurt everyone, as prices have increased across the economy. In January, grocery prices were 7.4 percent higher than in January 2021, the U.S. Department of Agriculture reported.

Gas prices rose throughout 2021. Prices hit levels not seen since 2014, the U.S. Energy Information Administration reported.

But now, since Russia’s invasion has tampered with the global oil markets, prices are climbing again. Costs are expected to keep climbing as Russia continues its war with Ukraine, USA Today reported.

Besides rising gas prices, 50 percent of Americans don’t approve of how Biden handled the growing Russia-Ukraine crisis, the Marist Poll reported.

With all of these issues directly impacting individual Americans, Biden’s first year has fallen far short of all that he promised during his campaign.

The poll was conducted among 1,264 U.S. adults from Feb. 15-21, before Russia invaded Ukraine. The survey’s margin of error is plus- or minus-3.5 percentage points.

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