While voters continue to have serious concerns about Joe Biden’s mental health, they are even less impressed with his vice president, according to the latest national NBC News poll.
Kamala Harris has a historically low approval rating of 32 percent in survey, compared with 49 percent who have a negative view of her. Thirty-nine percent of respondents said they had a “very negative” view of Harris.
Her net negative rating of -17 is reportedly the worst for any vice president in the NBC poll’s history.
In Oct. 2019, then-Vice President Mike Pence had a 34% positive, 38% negative rating (-4).
In Dec. 2010, Joe Biden’s rating was 34% positive, 33% negative (+1).
In May 2003, Dick Cheney was at 47% positive, 24% negative (+23).
And in March of 1995, Al Gore’s rating in the poll was 42% positive, 27% negative (+15).
Kamala Harris’ terrible poll numbers come amid a concerted White House effort to broaden her appeal so she isn’t a liability on the Biden/Harris reelection campaign trail. While both Biden and Harris have seen historically low approval ratings throughout their time in office, Harris has consistently been the more unpopular of the two.
Axios reported in April that Senior Biden adviser Anita Dunn tasked White House political teams to schedule events featuring Harris promoting issues like abortion that are popular with their left-wing base.
Over the weekend, Harris marked the first anniversary of the Supreme Court’s Dobbs v. Jackson ruling by blasting pro-life lawmakers as “extremists.”
“This fight is not only about people in one particular state; these extremists plan to take their agenda national. And that agenda, by the way, goes way beyond reproductive rights,” Harris declared at a pro-abortion rally Saturday in Charlotte, North Carolina.
“Many of these same folks attack the right to vote, which prevents the teaching of America’s history.”
Harris claimed that pro-life Republicans are passing laws in State legislatures that deprive women of health care “rights,” and they “don’t even understand how a woman’s body actually works,” despite the fact that many pro-life lawmakers are women.
In the NBC poll also found that Joe Biden had a 43 percent job-approval rating among all registered voters, with 53 percent disapproving.
A combined 44 percent of registered voters say they’d “definitely” or “probably” consider voting for a third-party or independent candidate for president — if the other candidates include Biden and Trump. That’s a greater share than the poll found saying that in the 2008 and 2012 cycles, but it’s down slightly from the 46 percent who said they’d consider a third-party candidate in 2016.
The survey also showed that majorities of registered voters had concerns about the mental and physical health of both Biden and former president Donald Trump.
Sixty-eight percent of voters were concerned that Biden doesn’t have the necessary mental and physical health to be president, including 55 percent who said they have “major” concerns, compared with 55 percent who said they have concerns about Trump’s mental and physical health, including 44 percent who had major concerns.
Despite these concerns, Biden has an edge over Trump in a head to head matchup, garnering support from 49 percent of registered voters versus Trump’s 45 percent.
In this hypothetical rematch, Biden enjoys advantages among women (55 percent-38 percent), voters 18-34 (65 percent-30 percent), Latinos (66 percent-26 percent) and Black voters (73 percent-20 percent), as well as independents (47 percent-33 percent) and those who “somewhat” disapprove of Biden’s job as president (50 percent-39 percent).
Trump, meanwhile, has the edge among white voters (51 percent-43 percent), men (51 percent-42 percent), whites without college degrees (60 percent-35 percent) and rural voters (68 percent-26 percent).
In a hypothetical contest between Biden and Florida Governor Ron DeSantis, the two men are tied at 47 percent each.
