A large majority of Americans agree with Donald Trump’s decision to hold next week’s expected nuclear disarmament summit with Kim Jong-un, but very few expect the president to accomplish his goal.
Fully 72 per cent of U.S. voters, including half of Democrats, approve of Trump meeting with the North Korean dictator in person, an unprecedented move for an American president.
But just 46 per cent believe he’s prepared for nuclear negotiations. And a scant 20 per cent say North Korea will ‘ever give up their nuclear weapons.’
Among Republicans, Trump’s own party, only 30 per cent say the unexpected could actually happen, according to a new poll from Quinnipiac University.
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72 per cent of U.S. voters approve of President Trump’s coming meeting with Kim Jong-un but just 20 per cent believe dictator Kim Jong-un will ever surrender his nuclear weapons program
Kim, the communist nation’s supreme despot, is set to meet with Trump next week to negotiate nukes for economi sanctions relaxation
The Trump administration hopes to persuade Kim to irrevocably destroy North Korea’ nuclear weapons program, giving up his best means of national security against both the democratic West and his regional adversaries like South Korean and Japan.
In exchange Pyongyang would see the economic stranglehold of international sanctions loosened, allowing more trade and hard currency to flow in.
North Korea is perilously close to exhausting its reserves of hard currency, most of which it uses to finance its debts to China, its main trading partner.
The state of the hermit kingdom’s economy is notoriously hard to discern form the outside, but a money crisis there would provide much-needed leverage to the White House as it tightens the noose of a ‘maximum pressure’ campaign.
Trump’s approval rating in the Quinnipiac poll is in the doldrums overall: Voters disapprove of his job performance by a 51-40 margin. That’s a 3 per cent improvement from six weeks ago.
But a larger proportion, 49 per cent, approve of his handling of the economy
By a divided 49 – 46 percent, voters approve of the way Trump is handling the economy.
The Capella Hotel on Sentosa Island in Singapore will host next week’s summit, the first of its kind between an American president and a North Korean leader
‘Korea helps. The booming economy helps,’ Quinnipiac University Poll assistant director Tim Malloy said Wednesday.
‘President Donald Trump’s approval rating peeks out of the 30s just as he faces perhaps his biggest challenge yet – Kim Jong-un.’
But Trump is still deep under water when voters are asked to assess his personality traits.
‘Yes, he’s strong and intelligent but is he a role model for American kids? No way,’ Malloy added.
Is Donald Trump honest? Only 35 per cent say yes. A similar 56 per cent don’t believe he has ‘good learedship skills,’ and 55 per cent believe he doesn’t care about ‘average Americans.’
An astonishing 64 per cent say the president is not ‘level-headed.’ And 69 per cent don’t consider him a good role model for their children.
On the plus side, 62 per cent consider Trump a ‘strong person’ and 58 per cent call him ‘intelligent.’
The president’s negative approval ratings are typical for his administration: Positive reviews for Vice President Mike Pence, Press Secretary Sarah Sanders and attorney Rudy Giuliani are running low, at 35, 30 and 29 per cent, respectively.
The lone bright spot is first lady Melania Trump who is riding a wave of popularity following her kidney surgery.
American voters give her a 49-17 percent favorability rating, but 3 in 10 say that more than nearly three years since her husband became a presidential candidate, they still don’t know enough about her to form an opinion.
The Quinnipiac poll surveyed 1,223 voters nationwide, and has a margin of error of +/- 3.4 percentage points.