--- title: Donald Trump: Half of Americans More Confident in Him Now description: Roughly half of Americans are feeling "more confident" about Donald Trump's ability to serve as president after the election, a poll found canonical: https://time.com/4573627/donald-trump-more-confident-poll/ author: Sarah Begley article:opinion: false article:content_tier: free article:published_time: 2016-11-16T19:13:53.000Z article:modified_time: 2026-08-19T07:45:17.619Z article:section: Politics og:title: Half of Americans Are 'More Confident' in Donald Trump After the Election og:description: But 40% are less confident og:url: https://time.com/4573627/donald-trump-more-confident-poll/ og:site_name: TIME og:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt5a3dde1030e02408/6988aec4cf40a8160ac4595e/donaldtrump.jpeg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 og:image:width: 5306 og:image:height: 2985 og:image:alt: President-Elect Trump And Vice President-Elect Pence Meet With House Speaker Paul Ryan On Capitol Hill og:type: article twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: Half of Americans Are 'More Confident' in Donald Trump After the Election twitter:description: But 40% are less confident twitter:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt5a3dde1030e02408/6988aec4cf40a8160ac4595e/donaldtrump.jpeg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 ---  # Half of Americans Are 'More Confident' in Donald Trump After the Election > Sponsored content. 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It explains the politics, personalities and power dynamics behind the headlines, twice a week. #### Where can I get analysis of Washington politics by email? D.C. Brief is TIME's free Washington politics newsletter, available at time.com/newsletters. It is written by a TIME senior correspondent who covers the capital full time. #### Who writes TIME's D.C. Brief? Philip Elliott, a senior correspondent at TIME, writes D.C. Brief. #### Is D.C. Brief free? Yes. D.C. Brief is free at time.com/newsletters. ### Sources * TIME Newsletters: [time.com/newsletters](/c/time-nl-dcbrief-2026q3/newsletters?i=3fa8cfd2-c13e-4967-9b34-5976a8a09f10&cr=time-nl-dcbrief-2026q3-v1) by [Sarah Begley](https://time.com/author/sarah-begley/) ## Sarah Begley Nov 16, 2016 7:13 PM UTC  President-elect Donald Trump speaks during a meeting with House Speaker Paul Ryan (R-WI) at the U.S. Capitol November 10, 2016 in Washington, DC. President-elect Donald Trump speaks during a meeting with House Speaker Paul Ryan (R-WI) at the U.S. Capitol November 10, 2016 in Washington, DC. Zach Gibson—Getty Images by [Sarah Begley](https://time.com/author/sarah-begley/) ## Sarah Begley Nov 16, 2016 7:13 PM UTC Roughly half of Americans are feeling “more confident” about [Donald Trump’s](http://time.com/4573307/donald-trump-white-rage/) ability to serve as president after the election, based on his words and actions in the past week, a new poll reveals. The [Gallup](http://www.gallup.com/poll/197519/half-americans-confident-trump-election.aspx) poll found that 51% of Americans are feeling more confident in Trump, an uptick that is generally in line with responses after the elections of [George W. Bush](http://time.com/4564428/donald-trump-george-hw-jeb-bush/) and [Bill Clinton.](http://time.com/4538329/george-hw-bush-letter-bill-clinton-donald-trump/) However, 40% say they’re “less confident” in him after the election, a much larger proportion than Bush and Clinton respondents, Gallup found. The biggest gains in confidence happened among men (60%) and white people (61%). Among women, 42% said they were more confident and 50% said they were less confident. Among non-whites, 63% said they are less confident. Across all four groups, 9% said there was no change in their confidence level. Gallup polled 1,019 adults from Nov. 9 to 13, with a margin of sampling error of +/- 4 percentage points. ```json [{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"NewsArticle","@id":"https://time.com/4573627/donald-trump-more-confident-poll/","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://time.com/4573627/donald-trump-more-confident-poll/"},"headline":"Half of Americans Are 'More Confident' in Donald Trump After the Election","datePublished":"2016-11-16T19:13:53.000Z","dateModified":"2026-08-19T07:45:17.619Z","description":"But 40% are less confident","url":"https://time.com/4573627/donald-trump-more-confident-poll/","keywords":["2016 Election","2016 Election"],"thumbnailUrl":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt5a3dde1030e02408/6988aec4cf40a8160ac4595e/donaldtrump.jpeg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","author":[{"@type":"Person","name":"Sarah Begley","jobTitle":null,"url":"https://time.com/author/sarah-begley/"}],"articleSection":"Politics","image":[{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt5a3dde1030e02408/6988aec4cf40a8160ac4595e/donaldtrump.jpeg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","width":1200,"height":675,"headline":"President-Elect Trump And Vice President-Elect Pence Meet With House Speaker Paul Ryan On Capitol Hill","caption":"President-Elect Trump And Vice President-Elect Pence Meet With House Speaker Paul Ryan On Capitol Hill","creditText":"Zach Gibson—Getty Images","representativeOfPage":true}],"publisher":{"@type":"Organization","name":"Time","url":"https://time.com/","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://time.com/images/logo.png","width":528,"height":156},"foundingDate":"March 3, 1923","sameAs":["https://www.facebook.com/time","https://www.instagram.com/time/?hl=en","https://twitter.com/time","https://www.pinterest.com/timemagazine"]}},{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"BreadcrumbList","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"item":{"@id":"/section/politics/","name":"Politics"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"item":{"@id":"/tag/2016-election/","name":"2016 Election"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":3,"item":{"@id":"https://time.com/4573627/donald-trump-more-confident-poll/","name":"Half of Americans Are 'More Confident' in Donald Trump After the Election"}}]}] ```