--- title: Donald Trump: Most Americans Don't Think He Can Handle Job description: Americans have little confidence in President-elect Donald Trump's abilities to handle his presidential duties, a new poll found canonical: https://time.com/4620230/donald-trump-gallup-poll-president/ author: Charlotte Alter article:opinion: false article:content_tier: free article:published_time: 2017-01-02T18:19:59.000Z article:modified_time: 2026-02-23T02:30:43.078Z article:section: Politics og:title: Most Americans Don't Think Donald Trump Can Handle Being President og:description: According to a Gallup poll og:url: https://time.com/4620230/donald-trump-gallup-poll-president/ og:site_name: TIME og:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt9bc368a4a5e663c8/6988b43a2dce0135f99ebd22/gettyimages-630638446.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 og:image:width: 2466 og:image:height: 1387 og:image:alt: President-elect Donald Trump at Mar-a-Lago Club og:type: article twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: Most Americans Don't Think Donald Trump Can Handle Being President twitter:description: According to a Gallup poll twitter:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt9bc368a4a5e663c8/6988b43a2dce0135f99ebd22/gettyimages-630638446.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 ---  # Poll: Most Americans Don't Think Donald Trump Can Handle Being President > Sponsored content. 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Brief is TIME's Washington newsletter, written by senior correspondent Philip Elliott. It explains the politics, personalities and power dynamics behind the headlines, three times a week. It reaches 85,000 subscribers with a 37.0% open rate as of August 2026. #### 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.  by [Charlotte Alter](https://time.com/author/charlotte-alter/)  ## Charlotte Alter Senior Correspondent Jan 2, 2017 6:19 PM UTC  President-elect Donald Trump prepares to make a statement to the media following a day of transition team meetings at Mar-a-Lago Club in Palm Beach, Fl. on Dec. 28, 2016. President-elect Donald Trump prepares to make a statement to the media following a day of transition team meetings at Mar-a-Lago Club in Palm Beach, Fl. on Dec. 28, 2016.Ricky Carioti—The Washington Post/Getty Images  by [Charlotte Alter](https://time.com/author/charlotte-alter/)  ## Charlotte Alter Senior Correspondent Jan 2, 2017 6:19 PM UTC Americans have [little confidence](http://www.gallup.com/poll/201158/skeptical-trump-handle-presidential-duties.aspx?g%5Fsource=Politics&g%5Fmedium=lead&g%5Fcampaign=tiles) in President-elect [Donald Trump’s](http://time.com/4618844/donald-trump-barack-obama-israel/) abilities to handle his presidential duties, with less than half of Americans saying they trust him to prevent major scandals, handle an international crisis, or use military force responsibly. [According to a Gallup poll](http://www.gallup.com/poll/201158/skeptical-trump-handle-presidential-duties.aspx?g%5Fsource=Politics&g%5Fmedium=lead&g%5Fcampaign=tiles) released Monday, Americans have significantly less faith in [Trump](http://time.com/4619941/donald-trump-new-years-eve-tweet/) than they had in his predecessors. Only 44% said they are confident Trump will avoid major scandals in his Administration, 46% said they are confident in Trump’s ability to handle an international crisis, and 47% said they trust him to use military force wisely. When the same questions were asked at the start of Barack Obama’s, George W. Bush’s and Bill Clinton’s terms, roughly three-quarters of Americans said they had confidence in the newly elected President in these areas. When compared with Gallup’s averages of confidence polling in his predecessors, Trump comes up short: he has a 32-point confidence deficit in his ability to avoid scandals in his Administration, a 29-point deficit in his ability to use military force well and a 28-point deficit in his ability to manage the Executive Branch. Most Americans (60%) believe Trump will be able to get things done with Congress, but even there he comes up far behind his predecessors — the average number of Americans with confidence in Obama, Bush and Clinton to work with Congress was 82%. The data also reflects a more polarized America than Obama or Bush faced when they came into office. On average, only 21% of Democrats have confidence in Trump’s ability to handle the various responsibilities of the presidency. By contrast, roughly two-thirds of Republicans had some confidence in Obama and the same was true for Bush and Democrats. But Trump even has a confidence deficit among members of his own party: only 84% of Republicans have confidence in his abilities as President, compared with 94% of Democrats who trusted Obama and 95% of Republicans who had faith in Bush. The poll’s sample included 1,028 adults and had a margin of error of +/- 4%. ```json [{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"NewsArticle","@id":"https://time.com/4620230/donald-trump-gallup-poll-president/","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://time.com/4620230/donald-trump-gallup-poll-president/"},"headline":"Poll: Most Americans Don't Think Donald Trump Can Handle Being President","datePublished":"2017-01-02T18:19:59.000Z","dateModified":"2026-02-23T02:30:43.078Z","description":"According to a Gallup poll","url":"https://time.com/4620230/donald-trump-gallup-poll-president/","keywords":["Donald Trump","Americans","Gallup","confidence","trump"],"thumbnailUrl":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt9bc368a4a5e663c8/6988b43a2dce0135f99ebd22/gettyimages-630638446.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","author":[{"@type":"Person","name":"Charlotte Alter","jobTitle":"Senior Correspondent","url":"https://time.com/author/charlotte-alter/"}],"articleSection":"Politics","image":[{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt9bc368a4a5e663c8/6988b43a2dce0135f99ebd22/gettyimages-630638446.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","width":1200,"height":675,"headline":"President-elect Donald Trump at Mar-a-Lago Club","caption":"President-elect Donald Trump at Mar-a-Lago Club","creditText":"Ricky Carioti—The Washington Post/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/donald-trump/","name":"Donald Trump"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":3,"item":{"@id":"https://time.com/4620230/donald-trump-gallup-poll-president/","name":"Poll: Most Americans Don't Think Donald Trump Can Handle Being President"}}]}] ```