Voters See A Stronger America, Optimistic About Future

Voters tend to believe President Trump has made America stronger and remain more optimistic about the nation’s future than they have been in years.

Forty-six percent (46%) of Likely U.S. Voters think the United States has become a stronger nation since Trump’s election, according to the latest Rasmussen Reports national telephone and online survey. Forty-one percent (41%) say he’s made the nation weaker, while 10% say the country is about the same. (To see survey question wording, click here.)

Fifty percent (50%) think America’s best days are in the future, down slightly from last April’s all-time high of 54%,but still higher than it has been in regular surveying since 2006. Only 30% say the country’s best days are in the past. Twenty percent (20%) are undecided.

In most surveys since November 2006, the number of voters who felt America’s best days were in the future ran in the mid- to upper 30s. As recently as May 2017, 52% thought America’s best days were in the past.

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The survey of 1,000 Likely Voters was conducted February 4-5, 2020 by Rasmussen Reports. The margin of sampling error is +/- 3 percentage points with a 95% level of confidence. Field work for all Rasmussen Reports surveys is conducted by Pulse Opinion Research, LLC. See methodology.

Economic confidence is at a five-year high in the latest Rasmussen Reports Consumer Spending Update. We'll update these findings next week.

Predictably, 80% of Republicans believe Trump has made the country stronger, a view shared by just 20% of Democrats and 40% of voters not affiliated with either major political party. Sixty-nine percent (69%) of Democrats and 42% of unaffiliateds say the president has made America weaker.

While 67% of GOP voters think America’s best days are in the future, just 39% of Democrats and 43% of unaffiliated voters agree.

Men feel much more strongly than women that Trump has made the United States stronger, but even a plurality of female voters agrees with males that the country’s best days are in the future.

Blacks are less likely to share that optimism than whites and other minority voters are.

Seniors are the age group most pessimistic about where the nation is headed.

Forty-two percent (42%) of all voters think the country is heading in the right direction. This number ran in the mid- to upper 20s for much of 2016, President Obama's last full year in office.

Health care and the economy dominate voter concerns as America begins the slow formal crawl to the next presidential election.

Additional information from this survey and a full demographic breakdown are available to Platinum Members only.

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