On the negative side of the ledger, um, well . . . let’s do this in list form:

AD

I’m sure I am missing a fair amount, but in the category of serious norm violations, those look like the highlights to me.

AD

Well, surely none of this matters, because Trump shocked the world with his election victory and will quickly unite the country — wait, what’s this Quinnipiac poll from two days ago?

American voters approve 55–39 percent of the job President Barack Obama is doing, his best approval rating in seven years, according to a Quinnipiac University national poll released today. These same voters disapprove 51–37 percent of the way Donald Trump is handling his job as president-elect . .. The measures of Trump’s personal qualities all are more negative than they were in a Nov. 22 Quinnipiac University poll:

Well, that’s just one poll, so — oh, wait, there’s this Pew Research Center survey that also came out two days ago:

The latest national survey by Pew Research Center, conducted Jan. 4-9 among 1,502 adults, finds that 39% approve of the job President-elect Trump has done so far explaining his policies and plans for the future to the American people, while a larger share (55%) say they disapprove. Overall ratings have changed little since December and remain highly partisan: 72% of Republicans and Republican leaners approve of the job he is doing, compared with just 13% of Democrats and Democratic leaners . … While Trump has yet to release his personal tax returns, the public thinks that he has a responsibility to do so: 60% say this, compared with 33% who say he does not have a responsibility to release his tax returns.

Fine, two polls. Two measly polls — just a sec, I see that Gallup has something out Friday:

In Gallup polling conducted two weeks before Inauguration Day, President-elect Donald Trump continues to garner historically low approval for his transition performance, with 51% of Americans disapproving of how he is handling the presidential transition and 44% approving. Last month, the public was split on this question, with 48% approving and 48% disapproving. Trump’s 48% transition approval rating in December was already the lowest for any presidential transition Gallup has measured, starting with Bill Clinton’s in 1992-1993. Trump’s current rating only further separates him from his predecessors — particularly Barack Obama, who earned 83% approval for his handling of the transition process in January 2009, up from 75% in mid-December 2008.

Another stunning tidbit: Trump’s approval among independents has fallen from 46 percent to 33 percent over the past month.

Gallup goes on to note that Trump’s bad polling numbers are not strictly a function of his relatively small vote share or his loss in the popular vote. Bill Clinton won a lower percentage of the vote when he won in 1992. George W. Bush lost the popular vote and litigated the election all the way to a controversial Supreme Court decision. And yet:

AD

AD

Loyal Trump supporters will scoff at polling numbers and resort to the go-to move of highlighting all the ways in which the polls were wrong right before Election Day. Except that the national polling numbers — which is what these surveys most closely resemble — turned out to be pretty darned accurate.

There is no way for Trump or his team to spin this point: Trump will be the most unpopular president on his Inauguration Day in the history of polling. And the trendlines during his transition have gone in a negative direction.

If there’s an upside for the president-elect, it is that he seemingly has nowhere to go but up. Obama’s popular support peaked when he was inaugurated. Once he had to get around to governing, things went downhill for a good long while. Even semi-competent governance could cause his poll numbers among independents and Democrats to rise. Plus, political polarization is so strong that Republicans are likely to stay loyal for a while.

AD

AD

If there’s a downside for the president-elect, it is that things are not likely to get that much better, and they actually can get worse. Part of the reason Trump won the election was the growing disconnect between economic reality and the partisan perception of that reality. This meant that Democrats did not benefit from signs of an improving economy in 2016. But this also means that even if the economy continues to improve in 2017, there is no guarantee that Trump skeptics will change their mind about him. As bad as his numbers are now, he may also face a hard ceiling on his support short of a 9/11-type moment.

As for getting worse, all three polls show the same distribution of support: nothing from Democrats, weak support from independents, and robust support from Republicans. If the economy goes into recession, or Trump feuds with the congressional wing of the GOP, or if there is executive branch scandal after executive branch scandal, those numbers will melt like Joe Biden receiving an award from Barack Obama.