First Draft: Are These Trump's Worst Poll Numbers... Ever?
EXCLUSIVE: A new poll shared with Zeteo shows Trump’s approval rating falling to 33%, and widespread opposition to the war in Iran. Plus, AOC is hitting back against her critics on the left.
On this day in 1981, President Ronald Reagan, his press secretary James Brady, and two officers were shot outside the Washington Hilton Hotel. All four survived, though Brady was paralyzed. The shooter, John Hinckley Jr., was charged with attempting to assassinate the president but found not guilty by reason of insanity.
Good morning! Andrew here. Two days after 8 million people took to the streets to reject Donald Trump as part of the nationwide “No Kings” protests, a new poll shared exclusively with Zeteo finds Trump with what may be his worst approval rating of his political career.
Today’s newsletter is paywall-free, thanks to our sponsor, Ground News.
In today’s ‘First Draft,’ only 33% of Americans approve of Trump’s job performance, not even MAGA voters want their Mad King to put boots on the ground in Iran, AOC is tired of being hit from the left, and the US will allow Cuba to receive one oil tanker.
Everybody Hates Don
Donald Trump keeps musing about his desire to serve an unconstitutional third term. Last week, he shared a post on Truth Social about how he deserves a third term “as a reward” for the 2020 election being stolen from him – which is, of course, a complete lie.
New polling shared exclusively with Zeteo demonstrates just how delusional our president really is: Only 33% of Americans approve of the job he is doing, and 62% disapprove, according to the UMass Amherst national poll. This figure may well represent the worst approval rating of Trump’s political career.
The UMass poll finds broad opposition to Trump’s illegal and dangerous war in Iran: 29% say they approve of Trump’s military actions against Iran, while 54% disapprove.
The war has more support among MAGA fans. “With the war entering its second month, our findings suggest that the Trump administration has withstood the criticism coming from within its own base,” Tatishe Nteta, director of the poll and political science professor at UMass Amherst, tells Zeteo.
But that could change if Trump decides to put boots on the ground in Iran. Only 8% of Americans believe the US should send ground troops, and 67% disagree with the idea, per the UMass poll. Among people who “very much” identify with MAGA, 30% say the US should put boots on the ground in Iran, while 36% of MAGA devotees disagree.
As Zeteo has reported, Trump has for weeks been weighing a ground invasion of Iran – despite obvious logistical problems with the idea – and senior administration officials have been briefed that efforts to seize Kharg Island, a decades-long goal for Trump, would result in “considerable” American casualties.
The Washington Post reported over the weekend that the Department of Defense “is preparing for weeks of ground operations in Iran,” citing US officials, “as thousands of American soldiers and Marines arrive in the Middle East for what could become a dangerous new phase of the war should President Donald Trump choose to escalate.”
Trump spoke with the Financial Times on Sunday about his desire to “take the oil in Iran” by occupying Kharg Island, from where most of Iran’s oil is exported. Trump complained that “stupid people back in the US say: ‘Why are you doing that?’ But they’re stupid people.”
Americans, by and large, understand the US-Israeli war in Iran is causing energy prices to spike: 79% say invading Iran will increase oil prices, while only 7% disagree.
“The American public does not seem to be buying what President Donald Trump is selling when it comes to the war with Iran,” Nteta says.
Outside of the war, which could get much worse at any moment, Trump’s approval on key issues ranges from bad to catastrophic: 24% say Trump has handled inflation well, 28% say he’s handled tariffs well, and 22% believe the president has done a good job handling the release of information concerning his former friend Jeffrey Epstein, the world’s most famous pedophile.
According to the UMass poll, 59% of Americans agree with the following statement: “The Trump administration is hiding important information about the Epstein case.” And 50% of Americans believe Trump’s attacks on Iran are meant to distract from the Epstein files, while 30% disagree. Those figures mirror the findings of a recent Data for Progress poll conducted on behalf of Drop Site News and Zeteo.
Nteta notes that immigration – Trump’s signature issue – has “quickly become one of the president’s most pressing vulnerabilities.” Only 35% say he’s handled immigration well, and 60% say he hasn’t.
The UMass poll is one of many showing Americans are turning on Trump. The president’s response, beyond urging his party to pass a sweeping voter-suppression bill, is to publicly pretend it isn’t happening.
“Right now my polls are better than they’ve ever been before,” he lied on Friday.
🇮🇷 Iran War Updates
Death tolls:
Iran: Iran’s deputy health minister told Al Jazeera that at least 1,937 people had been killed in US-Israeli attacks. Iranian officials said earlier this month that nearly 20,000 people had been injured.
Lebanon: Israel has killed at least 1,238 people, including more than 120 children, in Lebanon, according to yesterday’s figures from the country’s Health Ministry.
US troops: At least 13 US troops have died in incidents related to the war.
Israel: At least 25, including six Israeli soldiers, have been killed and thousands injured in Iranian and Hezbollah attacks in Israel.
Elsewhere in the region: Dozens of others have been killed across the region, including four Palestinian women in the occupied West Bank.
And in more Iran war news…
Oil and uranium: Trump may want Iran’s oil, but according to the Wall Street Journal, he’s also considering an operation to “extract nearly 1,000 pounds of uranium.” Such a mission would be extremely risky and dangerous for US troops, experts noted.
Spain closes airspace to US military: Spain has closed its airspace to US aircraft involved in strikes on Iran, further cementing its opposition to the war after already saying the US cannot use joint military bases inside the country to launch attacks.
War widens: Iranian-backed Houthis claimed responsibility for missiles fired at Israel from Yemen, the first since the war began.
Israel kills reporters: An Israeli strike killed three Lebanese journalists, including Al-Mayadeen’s Fatima Ftouni, her brother, Mohammed, and Al-Manar’s Ali Shuaib. Their car was reportedly clearly marked “press.” Israel admitted to targeting Shuaib, whom it accused without evidence of being part of Hezbollah’s intelligence unit – an allegation the group, which controls Al-Manar, denied. Israel also admitted that it photoshopped an image of Shuaib in a Hezbollah uniform.
‘Buffer zone’: Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said Israel would “further expand” operations in southern Lebanon, though it was not clear if he was referring to territory beyond the Litani River. More than a million people have already been displaced.
A recent report shows that more than 11,000 US citizen children have had their parents detained by ICE. Of these arrests, nearly 60% have resulted in deportations. The impacts of such enforcement are undeniable – the Trump administration is leaving many children without their parents, resulting in devastating trauma and family separation.
What’s also troubling is the limited coverage that this story is receiving. Despite the urgency of the situation, only 10 outlets have covered the latest reports, and none of them were right-leaning news sources. This means that regardless of your political views, you may never see this story.
In a time this turbulent, don’t miss out on the facts. Ground News is a news app and website that scans 50,000+ articles while offering built-in bias comparisons, factuality checks, and funding transparency for every source. The Blindspot feature also highlights stories like this one that you might miss in your daily reading.
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(This portion of the post was sponsored content)
AOC Hits Back
Last year, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez rankled the left by voting against an amendment from conservative Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene to block $500 million for Israel’s Iron Dome and missile defense programs.
Ocasio-Cortez argued at the time that the measure would do “nothing to cut off offensive aid to Israel,” and would only target defensive aid “while allowing the actual bombs killing Palestinians to continue.” She ended up voting against the overall military funding bill and, to be clear, even Elon Musk’s Grok AI chatbot agrees that she has never actually “voted to approve weapons sales or major military aid packages to Israel.”
Nevertheless, eight months later, AOC is still catching heat from some on the left for her vote on the Iron Dome amendment – and now she’s hitting back.
Political commentator Ana Kasparian, from The Young Turks, tweeted at Ocasio-Cortez on Sunday, “You should vote to send Israel more money for weapons!”
AOC replied with a burn: “I never have. Feel free to continue lying publicly, though. Those checks don’t cash themselves and you aren’t talented enough to be relevant with the truth.”
🗞️ What You Need to Know
DHS chaos: With the partial shutdown dragging on and airport misery ongoing, Republicans who failed to pass funding tried to pass the buck. House Majority Leader Steve Scalise said senators had “buyer’s remorse” after voting to fund DHS but not ICE or part of Customs and Border Protection, but didn’t name any.
House of Mouse: Lindsey Graham didn’t let the DHS mess stop him from flying to Disney World. TMZ published snaps of the senator breakfasting at Chef Mickey’s. Graham said he flew to Orlando to meet Trump envoy Steve Witkoff.
Endorsement watch: Justice Democrats, backer of Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, Summer Lee, and other progressives, announced new endorsements: Saikat Chakrabarti in California’s 11th district and Adam Hamawy in New Jersey’s 12th.
DNC vs. AIPAC?: The Democratic National Committee will next month consider a resolution criticizing the pro-Israel lobby group by name, Semafor reported. The measure also “condemns the growing influence of dark money and corporate-backed independent expenditures in Democratic elections."
Piker likers: Three possible Democratic presidential hopefuls – Gavin Newsom, Ro Khanna, and Rahm Emanuel – told Politico they would speak to left-wing influencer Hasan Piker. Cory Booker, Ruben Gallego, and Elissa Slotkin said no – even though they’re all happy to go on Islamphobe Bill Maher’s HBO show!
🧠 Pop Quiz!
As a child, Senator Lindsey Graham earned a distinctive nickname from the patrons of the Sanitary Café, the bar his father owned in Central, South Carolina. What was it?
Keep your eyes out for the answer below!
🚨 Don’t Miss It!
Will Trump carry out a ground operation in Iran? Join Mehdi and Prem TODAY at 11am ET, 8am PT, or 4pm GMT, for Zeteo’s ‘Ask the Editor.”
Anywhere But America
🇵🇸 Don’t forget Gaza: An Israeli airstrike today killed at least three Palestinians in Gaza City. Over the weekend, Israel killed at least 10, including a 15-year-old boy as he was returning home after collecting aid at a UN food distribution point.
🇵🇸 More press attacks: Israeli soldiers detained CNN journalists in the occupied West Bank, after putting the crew’s photojournalist in a chokehold. In a rare condemnation, Israel said the soldiers’ actions represented a “serious ethical incident” and that the battalion would be suspended from operations in the West Bank, though as Al Jazeera noted, soldiers often face no significant consequences for wrongdoing.
🇷🇺 🇨🇺 Oil in: The US will allow a Russian tanker to reach Cuba, after a months-long blockade that has caused blackouts and amid dire threats from Donald Trump.
🇳🇵 Oli out: Nepal’s former prime minister Khadga Prasad Oli and former home minister Ramesh Lekhak were arrested over the deaths of protesters in September, shortly after ex-rapper Balendra Shah was elected prime minister.
🇸🇩 Sudan death toll climbs: At least 14 people were killed, and 23 others injured, in the central region of Kordofan of Sudan after the Rapid Support Forces and their allies carried out a targeted attack on residential areas in the city of Dilling.
🇨🇦 Canada’s NDP looks for comeback: Canada’s primary progressive party, the New Democrats (NDP), elected Avi Lewis, the husband of Zeteo contributor Naomi Klein, as its new leader in a decisive first ballot vote.
📊 Chart of the Day
With the SAVE Act, Republicans are proposing that over 5 million voting-age Americans have to drive at least an hour just to register to vote.
🧠 Trivia answer: “Stinkball.”
📺 Sunday Show Roundup
On CBS’s ‘Face the Nation,’ Border Czar Tom Homan said that the agency is planning to “continue an ICE presence” at airports until they feel that airports are fully staffed.
Meanwhile, on NBC’s ‘Meet the Press,’ GOP Senator James Lankford called Democrats’ demand for ICE to be kept away from polling places “absolutely absurd” – because obeying the law that bans federal officers from the polls is crazy, right?
“They trained activists to obstruct justice, encouraged them to put themselves in harm’s way, knowing they could get harmed. They got two martyrs, then they used their martyrs as their excuse to try to defund law enforcement.” That’s Senator Ron Johnson’s outlandish explanation on Fox for why Democrats are to blame for the partial DHS shutdown.
The GOP controls the House, Senate, and White House, but has failed to control the DHS funding battle. When Fox’s Maria Bartiromo called this out, GOP Rep. Lisa McClain had no good response – chalking up the fight to “radical Democrats” wanting open borders.
Democratic Rep. Jim Himes, ranking member on the House Intelligence Committee, said Trump lied about being in talks with Iran. “He just made it up that they’re in negotiations with the Iranians,” he told Margaret Brennan of CBS News.
🗓️ Mark Your Calendars
Monday, March 30: A federal court is scheduled to hold a hearing in the New York Times’s case accusing the Pentagon of violating a court order blocking its restrictive press access policy.
Tuesday, March 31: The Endangered Species Committee, aka the “God Squad” to environmental groups, is set to meet to consider exempting oil and gas drillers in the Gulf of Mexico from a mandate aimed at protecting endangered species.
Wednesday, April 1: The Supreme Court is scheduled to hear arguments over Trump’s bid to restrict birthright citizenship – one of the most high-profile cases this term. Plus, the launch window for NASA’s Artemis II mission, set to be the first crewed flight around the moon in more than half a century, will open.
Thursday, April 2: A US District Court will hold a hearing on a proposed $72.5 million settlement in a lawsuit from victims of Jeffrey Epstein, alleging Bank of America aided in their abuse.
ICYMI From Zeteo
Zeteo’s Martin Pengelly, Akshay Gokul, and Ninar Taha contributed to this newsletter.
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Kasparian is NOT on the left. She’s “politically homeless”—ie, her shift to the right has failed. She’ll walk either side of the street, depending on who is offering the most.
It does not matter what Trump's poll numbers are if voters aren't offered a viable, meaningful alternative. So, instead of cheering approval ratings, how about instead spending time and effort working to replace the right wing with something constructive that helps people?