Americans don’t share President Donald Trump’s enthusiasm for his costly renovation projects in Washington, D.C., according to CNN’s data guru.
Harry Enten, the network’s chief data analyst, said Americans are “p---ed off” about Trump’s myriad vanity projects throughout the capital, which so far include the White House ballroom, the Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool, the Oval Office, the Kennedy Center, and even a proposed “Arc de Trump.”
“Americans want no part of these D.C. renovation building projects that Trump seems to be absolutely in adoration of. He seems to be perhaps the only one,” Enten said Friday on CNN News Central.
The data analyst cited a Washington Post/Ipsos poll that found nearly 2 in 3 Americans, or 65 percent, feel dissatisfied or upset about Trump’s pet projects. Only 32 percent felt enthusiastic or satisfied, leaving Trump a staggering 33 points underwater when it comes to his renovations.
“It’s pretty clear here,” Enten said. “You can’t really get worse than that.”
Trump’s polling among independent voters was even more disastrous. The overwhelming majority, or 73 percent, said they were dissatisfied or upset with Trump’s D.C. projects. Just 21 percent said the opposite, meaning Trump was 52 points underwater among independent voters on his vanity projects.
“The independents seem to be pretty gosh darn important because they’re in the center of the electorate. You win independents, you win elections,” Enten said. “You’re 52 points underwater with independents. You think those congressional Republicans like Trump talking about these D.C. building projects? Absolutely not, because these are the types of numbers that make election nights go very, very wrong.”
Another poll by CBS News/YouGov also found that Americans think Trump is focused on the wrong things.
The survey found that 64 percent of Americans think Trump is focusing too much on his D.C. projects while 78 percent said he was focusing too little on lowering prices, which was one of his key campaign promises.
“We’re talking about four in five Americans say that the Trump administration is focusing too little on the reason that Donald Trump got re-elected to a second term,” Enten said.
“No wonder that Donald Trump has historically high disapproval ratings on inflation, historically low approval ratings on inflation, and the only one ever to cross the minus 50-point net approval rating barrier on inflation,” he added. “Because they think he’s not even focusing on the reason why he got re-elected.”
