The U.S. international outlook has changed dramatically with Joe Biden in the White House, a poll shows, with a majority now expecting U.S. dealings with traditional foes like Russia, Iran, China, and North Korea to only grow more hostile.
The change is in direct contrast to public sentiment in the President Donald Trump era at roughly the same point in the two administrations.
Now, 60 percent of U.S. adults say relations with adversaries will get worse, up from 26 percent four years ago, according to the poll from the Pearson Institute and The Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research.
The poll numbers come just days after the president attacked Russia for its actions in Ukraine while issuing grim warnings of “armageddon” ahead.
As Breitbart News reported, the president lamented his plight compares to that of former President John F. Kennedy and the Cuban Missile Crisis with the Soviet Union.
“We have not faced the prospect of Armageddon since Kennedy and the Cuban Missile Crisis,” Biden told supporters at a Democratic fundraiser in New York City.
President Joe Biden warned supporters on Thursday that the world is facing “Armageddon” due to Russian President Vladimir Putin’s invasion of Ukraine. https://t.co/PBSGeVpxEB
— Breitbart News (@BreitbartNews) October 7, 2022
Elsewhere the polling numbers are less dire for Joe Biden.
In general, 39 percent expect the country’s global standing to worsen, compared with 48 percent who said that in 2018, with results splitting along party lines.
“Those results really, clearly show that it’s hyperpartisanship” affecting how confidently or bleakly, respectively, Democrats and Republicans see the U.S. standing abroad, explained Sheila Kohanteb, a political scientist and executive director of the Global Forum at the Chicago-based Pearson Institute for the Study and Resolution of Global Conflicts.
Still, as Russia amps up its assault on Ukraine, tensions with China grow over Taiwan and other issues build as the U.S. confronts North Korea and Iran over those countries’ nuclear programs, similar percentages of Republicans and Democrats say that relationships with adversaries will get worse in the next year, the AP report sets out.
Allies have noted Biden’s stumbles in dealing with the world.
Joe Biden, whose inauguration was supposed to herald a return to international esteem for the U.S., has been slammed as “useless and nasty” by one of Britain’s leading newspapers. https://t.co/xfRB3b7hod
— Breitbart News (@BreitbartNews) October 9, 2022
The Pearson Institute/AP-NORC poll also shows strong support for a U.S. foreign policy that protects women and minorities around the world — even though few people think the U.S. is doing a world-beating job of protecting those same interests at home.
The poll of 1,003 adults was conducted Sep. 9-12 using a sample drawn from NORC’s probability-based AmeriSpeak Panel, which is designed to be representative of the U.S. population. The margin of sampling error for all respondents is plus or minus 4.0 percentage points.
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