By Jason Lange
WASHINGTON, Oct 19 (Reuters) – President Donald Trump’s approval rating fell to a record low as Americans worried about high gasoline prices and appeared ready to punish his Republican Party in the November 3 congressional elections, according to a Reuters/Ipsos poll that closed on Monday.
Some 31% of Americans approve of Trump’s performance in office, down a percentage point from two weeks earlier and the lowest level in either of his presidential terms, the four-day poll showed.
Asked which party they would vote for if the congressional elections were held today in what is known as a “generic ballot” question, some 47% of registered voters in the nationwide poll picked Democrats and 35% chose Republicans. The 12-point Democratic advantage was the widest over the current election cycle and could bolster Democratic hopes of seizing control of the US House of Representatives and the US Senate.
For Republicans, losing control of either chamber could complicate Trump’s agenda in the last two years of his term.
Generic ballot polls are national polls that provide an overall view of which party poll respondents want to see in charge in Congress. While these polls provide a view of national public sentiment, they do not capture all the nuances of the state-by-state and district-by-district contests that determine control of the Senate and House, contests in which Republicans hold some structural advantages.
The survey, which was conducted online, gathered responses from 1,679 US adults, including 1,279 registered voters. The poll’s results had a margin of error of 2 percentage points for all respondents and 3 points for registered voters.
(Reporting by Jason Lange in Washington, editing by Deepa Babington)
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