Biden’s Approval Ratings At An All-Time Low Following Taliban Takeover Of Afghanistan

Multiple polls have shown that the people of the United States are not pleased with how the President has handled the crisis in Afghanistan. Considering the two-decade-long war a failure, many feel that the President of the United States mishandled the withdrawal of the troops. While it is too early to say how it will affect Joe Biden politically, his approval ratings are alarmingly low.

Since taking office in January, Biden has had to handle multiple difficult issues. The border crisis, the pandemic, financial crisis and now the catastrophic situation in Afghanistan has plagued the Biden administration. All of these issues have played a role in the dropping approval ratings of the Democratic leader.

Reuters shared the results of a poll conducted by Reuters/Ipsos and a snap poll by Ipsos. Both polls conducted online had responses of around 1,000 individuals, most of them Democrats.

The Reuters/Ipsos poll conducted on Monday, Aug. 16 took place after the Taliban forces overthrew the Afghan government. Reflecting the opinion of Americans about the issue, the poll found that 46% approved of Biden’s performance in office. This was the lowest weekly polls recorded since he took office. The poll result was affected by the Taliban takeover, as the poll on Friday showed a 53% approval rating.

The two polls also recorded the opinion of Americans on other aspects of the Afghanistan crisis. 75% of Americans supported the decision to send more troops back to Afghanistan, the Ipsos poll found. Similar numbers supported the evacuation of Afghans who supported the US forces. Both Republicans and Democrats agreed that the swift fall of the Afghan government proved that the US should step away from the conflict.

FiveThirtyEight and RealClearPolitics polls both showed that Biden’s approval ratings had dipped below 50%, The Hill reported.

The FiveThirtyEight average of polls recorded Biden’s approval rating as 49.3%. It is the first time that his approval rating has dipped below 50% since entering office. The downward trajectory of his ratings had been noted since March. On July 27 the approval rating was still at 52.6%. The RealClearPolitics average of polls recorded Biden’s approval rating at 49.4%.

Biden’s handling of the withdrawal of troops, as well as evacuation after the takeover, has been heavily criticized.