"President Barack Obama’s final score card is a passing grade overall, but barely,” Tim Malloy, assistant director of the Quinnipiac University Poll, said in a news release. | Getty Poll: Obama has highest approval rating since 2012 reelection

As President-elect Donald Trump's inauguration nears, President Barack Obama continues to net high marks on his two-term record in the White House, a new Quinnipiac University poll shows. In fact, Obama will be turning over the keys to the Oval Office with his highest approval rating since he won his reelection four years ago.

Obama is just three percentage point shy of his high mark (53 percent) from 2012, according to the poll released Monday morning. But in a sign of the polarized nature of politics, Americans are roughly split on how to rate Obama's performance. Respondents are near even on whether Obama has done a great job (22 percent) or a bad job, the least favorable option), also at 22 percent.


"President Barack Obama’s final score card is a passing grade overall, but barely,” Tim Malloy, assistant director of the Quinnipiac University Poll, said in a news release.

The poll’s approval numbers match the larger trend for Obama. According to two different polling aggregators, Obama’s approval rebounded sometime around March, and for the most part, has continued on a glide path since then.

But regardless of their views of the president, Americans are still adamant that they are dissatisfied with the current state of affairs. An overwhelming majority of respondents (72 percent) are at least somewhat dissatisfied with the way things are going. Even after the election, this outlook includes a whopping 81 percent of Republicans, who now control all of Congress and the White House.

The Quinnipiac University Poll surveyed 1,071 respondents nationwide from Nov. 17-20. The poll was conducted using live interviews and includes a margin of error of plus or minus 3 percentage points.

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