Poll: Obama best liked among living US presidents; Biden, least

Of the five living men who have served as US president, Barack Obama receives the highest favorable rating (59%) and Joe Biden the lowest (39%). George W. Bush and Bill Clinton are rated more positively than negatively, while opinions about Donald Trump are divided, reported from the Gallup website.

Bush and Clinton are somewhat less familiar to Americans than the other three.

The results are from a January 21-27 Gallup survey taken shortly after Trump’s January 20 inauguration to a second term as president. The four other living presidents attended the inaugural ceremony. All five also attended the January 9 funeral of former president Jimmy Carter.

Trump’s and Biden’s ratings are essentially unchanged from those from a survey after the 2024 election, indicating neither has gotten an image boost from the news surrounding the presidential transition. Although Trump’s ratings are about equally split between positive and negative ratings, they are among his best since Gallup first measured opinions of him in 1999. He has had only one net-positive rating to date -- 50% favorable and 38% unfavorable -- in 2005, when he was featured in the reality television show “The Apprentice” and before he entered Republican politics.

Opitions of Trump were generally poor during his 2015-2016 presidential campaign, with an average of 33% of US adults viewing him positively. After he won the 2016 presidential election, his image improved, with 42% having a positive opinion of him, and this climbed further to 46% shortly after his first inauguration.

Trump’s favorability was mostly above 40% during his first term, but it dropped to 36% right before his departure in January 2021 amid a record spike in COVID-19 infections and the January 6 Capitol Hill riot. His ratings returned to the 40% level in July 2023, after he was indicted in the federal classified documents case.

Opinions of Biden -- now 39% favorable and 57% unfavorable -- are barely better than his worst evaluation since he became a well-known political figure. In June 2024, the favorable/unfavorable split for Biden was 37%/61%, given concerns about his issue positions and his age as polls showed him trailing Trump in a rematch of the 2020 election. Concerns about his age only intensified in the days after a poor performance in the first presidential debate with Trump on June 27.

The high point in Biden’s favorability was 61% in January 2017, near the end of his vice presidency. He nearly matched that in January 2021 with a 59% favorable rating immediately after being inaugurated as president.