CNN's Harry Enten presented fresh polling data measuring public opinion on President Donald Trump's war in Iran.
The 80-year-old president signed a memorandum of understanding Wednesday to reopen the Strait of Hormuz to commercial traffic and pause fighting for 60 days while negotiating the terms of a final deal on nuclear weapons, and Enten said Americans will likely wonder why he launched the war in the first place.
"Yeah, I think the American people are going, what was the point of all of that?" Enten said. "What was the point of all that? Because the American people hate it, and the way you can know that they hate it, just take a look. Trump's net approval ratings hit lows for Fox News and Fox polls. In May, he had his lowest-ever rating at minus-22 points. You come into the poll that was released last night, the second-lowest ever, one point better at minus-21 points, way underwater, and with independents."
"I know you love when I point out the independents – 55 points underwater," Enten added. "I mean, my goodness gracious. This was a political disaster. No wonder the president wants to move on from it."
Trump admitted that he feared becoming Herbert Hoover and being saddled with a global depression, and Enten said those concerns were justified.
"You mentioned Herbert Hoover, the economy, right?" he said. "That sunk his presidency, inflation is what is sinking Donald Trump's presidency to all-time lows, at least according to Fox, because just take a look here, look at Ipsos polling. Trump's approval rating on inflation pre-war – it was bad, right? It was 33 points underwater. But then look in the past month, the average, according to the Ipsos polling, look at that – 51 points underwater. There was no president ever before that had any poll in which he was 50 points underwater on inflation or worse, and the average of the Ipsos polling over the last month was 51 points underwater on inflation. The Iran war absolutely drove Trump to new lows on the issue that got him re-elected in the first place, inflation."
Enten looked at past presidents to get a sense of where public opinion would stand now that the Iran war appears to be over.
"Just take a look at this, [Joe] Biden, right, the Afghanistan withdrawal days," Enten said. "Biden had a negative net approval rating post-Afghanistan, Afghanistan withdrawal, all of them. His presidency was simply put, sunk by it. Now, I'm not saying that's necessarily what's going to happen with Donald Trump, but it is an ominous potential signal for him when, in fact, you have getting out of a situation the American people don't like."
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