Trump Approval Rating Ticks Down to 41 Percent
HARLOW: A new poll this morning shows the president's approval rating is down pretty low. 41 percent. This as the president also claims this morning he is the most popular Republican in the history of the party. Let's get the facts. CNN Political Commentator, Errol Louis is here. He did tweet this morning his approval is 90 percent. But this poll shows otherwise.</s>ERROL LOUIS, CNN POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: That's right. There are some polls, they're old polls. When he says new poll, that was the part I found confusing. There are some old polls that show that he is in that high percentage range among Republicans.</s>HARLOW: Within his party. Yes.</s>LOUIS: Right. Within his party. Second only to Ronald Reagan. That was fairly early in his term, though. Nothing recent comes anywhere near 90 percent. So unclear what he's talking about . There is an interesting question about why he continually says things that we can easily tell are not true. And that to me is sort of more interesting. Right? Sort of the Trump politics of deception.</s>HARLOW: This 41 percent is from a weekly Gallup poll. And it does show is that his disapproval rating of 56 percent has actually ticked up since like the news headlines were all about this immigration crisis at the border and the separation of family from -- children from their parents.</s>LOUIS: Right. His numbers are what we would call upside down, meaning the disapproval is substantially higher, beyond the margin of error, higher than the approval rating. For most politicians, this is a sign of real trouble, this is a sign of alarm. You know, if you're numbers are upside down, as you get closer to an election there's a real problem. If you're the president, as you get closer in this case to the midterm elections and your numbers are upside down, people who are running with you, members of your party, your allies, they also start to have problems. But Donald Trump, you know, he sort of banishes it with a tweet, and just says, I am -- you know, I am popular, so pay no attention to those facts in front of you."</s>HARLOW: What do you make of his Supreme Court pick just in terms of what it tells us about the president's mindset?</s>LOUIS: Well, I -- you know, what I take from it is that interestingly enough, although he always talks about the deep state and complains, he hates the Bushes, he literally just hates them.</s>HARLOW: This is a guy from the Bush 43 White House.</s>LOUIS: This is a guy from Bushland. He worked actually for H.W. Bush and then he worked for the son.</s>HARLOW: Yes, and then --</s>LOUIS: And he comes -- I mean, he's been involved in every partisan warfare project of the last 20 years. So he's a political battler really. And in the end when the chips are down, this is who Donald Trump has to rely on. This is who he has to turn to. He has to make peace with some elements of the party. So while he kind of acts eccentric a lot of the time, the president is, in fact, a practical politician. He knows that he's going to need the support of the mainstream of the party.</s>HARLOW: Right.</s>LOUIS: That's what this pick represents.</s>HARLOW: As he heads to Brussels, the NATO summit tomorrow, he's in the air right now, he chose this morning to say that his meeting with Vladimir Putin on Monday will likely be the easiest of all of the meetings. So easier than meeting with our allies in Brussels, easier than meeting with our key ally, Britain, Theresa May, tomorrow.</s>LOUIS: Yes.</s>HARLOW: What do you make of that?</s>LOUIS: Well, I mean, look, who we say is the key ally and who the president thinks is a key ally may be two different things. I mean, and frankly showing up in Moscow and taking orders is actually not all that hard, right. I mean --</s>HARLOW: But that's a big statement. I mean, you may not like what the UK -- you know, what NATO members are doing on contributing to, you know, defense spending, but you've got to admit they're our allies and we need them. And they came to our aid because Article 5 after 9/11, for example.</s>LOUIS: You're talking --</s>HARLOW: Rationally?</s>LOUIS: Not even rationally, you're talking about the standpoint of what the broad majority of Americans believe. What Donald Trump believes with regard to Russia, a source of increasing alarm to a lot of people, is something completely different. And he has sort of been on the attack against NATO. And on item after item when it comes to the European Union, when it comes to NATO, when it comes to our trade relationships, he appears to be doing things that coincidentally or not are almost precisely what Vladimir Putin wants.</s>HARLOW: Just to be very clear, is he factually correct or incorrect when he says that, you know, we need NATO less than Europe needs NATO?</s>LOUIS: Yes, no, that's -- look, it's an opinion of his. It's a shocking opinion. Not surprising at this point, but shocking.</s>HARLOW: Thank you, Errol. Nice to have you. President Trump issued two new pardons just moments ago. Guess who, next.