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Four months into Trump’s second term, Democrats remain deeply pessimistic about their party
Democrats remain pessimistic about the future of their party, six months after they suffered setbacks up and down the ballot at the hands of now-President Donald Trump and Republicans.
That’s a key finding in a newly released national poll from the Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research.
According to the survey, only about one-third of Democrats are very or somewhat optimistic about the future of the Democratic Party. That’s a steep decline from last July, when around six in 10 Democrats said they were optimistic.
The Democratic Party has been in the political wilderness since last November’s elections, when Republicans won back control of the White House and the Senate and defended their fragile House majority. And Republicans made gains among Black and Hispanic voters as well as younger voters, all traditional members of the Democratic Party’s base.
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Vice President Kamala Harris speaks at the Democratic National Convention on Aug. 22, 2024, in Chicago. The latest polls indicate the Democratic Party sinking to new favorability lows. (Fox News – Paul Steinhauser)
The survey, conducted May 1-5, points to an increase in optimism among Republicans, with 55% more optimistic about the future of the GOP, up from 47% last summer.
Since Trump’s return to power, an increasingly energized base of Democrats is urging party leaders to take a stronger stand in pushing back against the president’s sweeping and controversial agenda during the opening months of his second administration. And their anger is directed not only at Republicans but also at Democrats they feel aren’t vocal enough in their opposition to Trump.
And that’s fueled the plunge in the Democratic Party’s favorable ratings, which have hit all-time lows in several new polls so far this year.
According to the AP-NORC survey, only around a third of all respondents have a positive view of the party. The GOP didn’t fare much better, with only around four in 10 adults holding a favorable view of the Republican Party.
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Some top Democrats were sampled in the poll.
Sen. Bernie Sanders of Vermont, the longtime progressive champion and 2016 and 2020 Democratic presidential nomination runner-up, was viewed positively by roughly four in 10 Americans. But around three-quarters of self-described Democrats questioned held a favorable view of Sanders.
Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and Sen. Bernie Sanders participate in a stop on the «Fighting Oligarchy» tour in Bakersfield, California, on April 15, 2025. (Reuters/Aude Guerrucci)
Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez of New York, the progressive firebrand who has teamed up with Sanders this year for a series of large rallies across the country, was viewed positively by only three out of 10 adults. Around half of Democrats held a favorable opinion of the four-term representative, who is seen as a possible 2028 Democratic presidential contender.
There are also suggestions that Ocasio-Cortez may primary challenge longtime Senate Democratic leader Chuck Schumer of New York when he’s up for re-election in 2028.
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Only 21% of adults view Schumer favorably. A third of self-described Democrats said they view him positively, but that’s a dramatic drop from December, when half of Democrats questioned held a favorable opinion of the 74-year-old senator.
Many Democrats heavily criticized Schumer earlier this year for his support of a GOP-crafted funding bill that kept the federal government from shutting down.
Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer speaks on Capitol Hill, on April 29, 2025. (AP Photo/Rod Lamkey, Jr.)
The AP-NORC poll is the latest survey to spell trouble for the Democratic Party.
The Democrats’ ratings stood underwater in the most recent Fox News national poll at 41% favorable and 56% unfavorable in a survey conducted April 18-21.
That’s an all-time low for the Democrats in Fox News polling. And for the first time in a decade, the party’s standing was lower than that of the GOP, which stood at 44% favorable and 54% unfavorable.
The figures were reversed last summer, when Fox News last asked the party favorability question in one of its surveys.
The Democratic Party’s favorable ratings were well in negative territory in a Pew Research national survey – 38% favorable, 60% unfavorable – conducted in early April and at 36% favorable, 60% unfavorable in a Wall Street Journal poll in the field a couple of weeks earlier.
And national polls conducted in February by Quinnipiac University and March by CNN and by NBC News also indicated the favorable ratings for the Democratic Party sinking to all-time lows.
But there’s more.
Confidence in the Democratic Party’s congressional leadership sunk to an all-time low, according to a Gallup poll conducted early last month.
The confidence rating for Democrats’ leadership in Congress stood at 25% in the survey, which was nine points below the previous low of 34% recorded in 2023.
And the semi-annual Harvard Youth Poll, which was released late last month, indicated that approval ratings for Democrats in Congress among Americans aged 18-29 nosedived.
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An ABC News/Washington Post/Ipsos poll conducted in mid-April indicated that more respondents trusted Trump (40%) than Democrats in Congress (32%) to handle the nation’s main problems. The results came even as Trump’s approval ratings have slid into negative territory since returning to the White House.
And a Reuters/Ipsos poll conducted late last month suggested Republicans hold a significant advantage over Democrats on two top issues: the economy and immigration.
Politics,Elections,Polls,Fox News Elections Polls,Democratic Party,Republicans,Bernie Sanders,Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez,Chuck Schumer
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WATCH: Lawmakers break down how billions in the ‘big, beautiful bill’ boost Trump’s immigration crackdown
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President Donald Trump’s «big, beautiful bill» was signed into law earlier this month, with Republican lawmakers celebrating a broad range of GOP victories in the massive tax-and-spending legislation.
That includes billions of dollars aimed at Trump’s crackdown on illegal immigration in the U.S. Nearly $30 billion is marked for Immigrations and Customs Enforcement (ICE) alone, and $45 billion is going toward building up detention facility capacity.
House Republicans who spoke with Fox News Digital last week hailed that funding boost, even as critics of the Trump administration accuse the White House of taking too heavy a hand on the issue.
«Having that money to now be able to work on the wall along the southern border, to be able to hire more agents, to pay them more, to invest in the technology, to patrol and secure the border – it is hugely important,» Rep. David Kustoff, R-Tenn., told Fox News Digital. «If you ask President Trump, that was the most important issue of the 2024 election.»
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President Donald Trump’s immigration agenda got a huge boost in the «big, beautiful bill.» (Win McNamee/Getty Images and ICE)
Rep. Michael Guest, R-Tenn., who chairs the Subcommittee on Border Security and Enforcement on the House Homeland Security Committee, said the detention facility funding is particularly significant.
Guest urged ICE to use those funds to ramp up «targeted» enforcement against illegal immigrants.
It comes as many on the left and some on the right have urged the Trump administration not to go too far in rounding up suspected illegal immigrants who otherwise pose no known threat to the public.
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Rep. Michael Guest urged the funding be used for «targeted» enforcement. (Getty Images)
«I think targeted enforcement, making sure that they’re going after the worst of the worst – those individuals who have either committed crimes in the United States or we learn after they released into the interior that they had committed crimes in their country origin, [or] those people who have final orders of removal,» Guest said.
«Those are the people that I believe that ICE needs to be targeting. Those are the people where you see widespread support from the American public that they want to get off the street.»
Rep. Ralph Norman, R-S.C., pointed out that ICE had been asking for that funding for some time.
«Tom Homan has done a tremendous job. He’s indicated for a while he needs more money to keep doing his job. And he’s being fought by everybody, particularly the sanctuary cities, to prevent that from happening,» Norman said. «The least we can do is provide the funding, and we did it.»
And Rep. Derrick Van Orden, R-Wis., said he hoped the increased border and immigration crackdown would help fight the ongoing drug crisis still plaguing the U.S.
Rep. Ralph Norman said border czar Tom Homan has «done a tremendous job.» (Williams/CQ-Roll Call, Inc)
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«So in order to have a secured border, in order get rid of these criminal, illegal aliens that are raping and murdering American citizens on the regular, we have to have a very strong immigration enforcement system,» Van Orden said.
Reps. Brandon Gill, R-Texas, and Andrew Clyde, R-Ga., highlighted the funding for Trump’s border wall and for more ICE personnel, respectively.
The bill passed the House earlier this month and was signed into law by Trump on the Fourth of July.
In addition to funding immigration operations, it also extends key parts of Trump’s 2017 Tax Cuts and Jobs Act (TCJA), rolls back some Biden administration-era green energy subsidies, and imposes new work requirements for federal aid.
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Ukrainians are taking to the streets after the passage of a controversial bill threatening the autonomy of two anti-corruption agencies.
The legislation gives the general prosecutor — who is appointed by the president — increased authority over the country’s National Anti-Corruption Bureau of Ukraine (NABU) and the Specialized Anti-Corruption Prosecutor’s Office (SAPO).
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy is now facing the largest protests since Russia’s 2022 invasion. Demonstrators gathered outside the presidential administration in Kyiv, while other protests took place in smaller cities across the country.
Ukrainians protest in the first wartime rally against a newly passed law, which curbs independence of anti-corruption institutions, amid Russia’s attack on Ukraine, in central Lviv, Ukraine, on July 22, 2025. (REUTERS/Roman Baluk)
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The vote came one day after two NABU officials were arrested over alleged ties to Russia, according to Reuters. The outlet said that Ukraine’s domestic security agency, which carried out the arrests, also conducted background checks.
«I gathered all heads of Ukraine’s law enforcement and anti-corruption agencies, along with the Prosecutor General. It was a much-needed meeting — a frank and constructive conversation that truly helps,» Zelenskyy wrote on X. «We all share a common enemy: the Russian occupiers. And defending the Ukrainian state requires a strong enough law enforcement and anti-corruption system — one that ensures a real sense of justice.»
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky and Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni (not pictured) hold a joint press conference during the Ukraine Recovery Conference 2025 (URC2025) at Roma Convention Center La Nuvola, on July 10, 2025, in Rome, Italy. (Antonio Masiello/Getty Images)
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«In effect, if this bill becomes law, the head of SAPO will become a nominal figure, while NABU will lose its independence and turn into a subdivision of the prosecutor general’s office,» the agencies said in a joint statement on Telegram, according to the Associated Press.
European Commissioner for Enlargement Marta Kos expressed concern over the vote, saying «the dismantling of key safeguards protecting NABU’s independence is a serious step back.»
Zelenskyy said in another X post, following a meeting that included NABU Director Semen Kryvonos, SAPO Prosecutor Oleksandr Klymenko, Prosecutor General Ruslan Kravchenko, and Head of the Security Service of Ukraine Vasyl Maliuk, that «anti-corruption infrastructure» needs to be «cleared» of «Russian influence.»
Protesters hold placards during a rally against a law that restricts independence of anti‑corruption institutions on July 22, 2025, in Kyiv, Ukraine. (Ivan Antypenko/Suspilne Ukraine/JSC «UA:PBC»/Global Images Ukraine via Getty Images)
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The Ukrainian government’s latest move risks endangering its bid to join the European Union, as a crackdown on internal corruption is a requirement. Additionally, it could strain the warming relationship between Zelenskyy and President Donald Trump, who has accused the Ukrainian leader of being a «dictator without elections.»
Both the U.S. and the E.U. have backed activists in Ukraine demanding independent institutions be established and empowered to clean up corruption, according to Axios. However, the pressure dropped significantly after Russia invaded Ukraine.
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