Just 39 percent of registered voters approve of President Joe Biden 36 days away from the midterm election, a Civiqs poll found Monday.
A majority (52 percent) of respondents disapproved of Biden, a high number for the leader of the Democrat Party desperate to hold the House and Senate come November. A presidential approval rating is a bellwether for how the president’s party performs in the midterms.
The Civiqs poll averaged 257,865 responses tracked between January 20, 2021 — October 2, 2022. The Civiqs tracking model captures the shifts in attitudes of various groups over time across all 50 states and Washington, DC. These changes can happen either rapidly or over time.
According to CNN’s senior data reporter, Harry Enten, Biden’s approval rating has been impacted by a drop in support among black voters. Since Biden assumed office, he has lost support among black voters by 23 points (64-87 percent). Black voters are a large portion of the Democrat vote.
Biden’s drop in black support is bleeding into the midterm races, CNN polling found.
Seventy-four percent of black voters still prefer the Democrat Party over the Republican Party. In 2020, 84 percent preferred the Democrat Party, a ten point swing and a massive amount of lost support. In 2018, 85 percent of black voters preferred the Democrat Party. Conversely, Republicans appear to have picked up three points in that timeframe from nine percent to 12 percent.
The drop in preference for Democrats is notable because many states with important Senate and gubernatorial races have a significant amount of black voters: Georgia 33 percent, North Carolina 23 percent, Ohio 11 percent, Pennsylvania 10 percent, and Nevada 10 percent.
The Democrats’ loss of support among black voters could greatly impact races in swing states where a significant amount of black voters live. Specifically in Georgia’s gubernatorial race, Democrat Stacey Abrams is polling 12 points worse in 2022 than she was in 2020 among black voters. In contrast, Gov. Brian Kemp (R) is polling better in 2022 than 2020 by a margin of 6 points.
The black vote is not the only segment of the electorate in which Democrats are struggling. Hispanics nationwide prefer the Democrat Party less by six points (60-54 percent) since the 2018 midterm elections. Meanwhile, Hispanics have moved toward Republicans by seven points (26-33 percent) in the same timeframe. The total difference between Democrats and Republicans is only 21 points, down from 34 points in 2018.
The Hispanic vote will be an important electoral segment in Nevada, Arizona, and North Carolina where battleground senate races show Republican and Democrat candidates in highly contested races.
Follow Wendell Husebø on Twitter @WendellHusebø. He is the author of Politics of Slave Morality.
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