Barack Obama continues to eclipse Donald Trump’s popularity, underlining the gulf between the two presidents as they trade blows on the final stretch of the midterm campaign.
With eight days until Election Day, a slew of polls continue to put the Democrat stalwart ahead of Trump among Americans, including all-important independent voters.
“Let’s just say that President Obama absolutely crushes President Trump when it comes to who is more liked by the American public,” CNN’s data guru Harry Enton said as he outlined one of the polls on Monday: aYouGov/Yahoo poll that put Obama’s approval at 55 percent compared to Trump at 37 percent.
The grim assessment comes days after Obama held his first two rallies of the 2026 midterm cycle, prompting Trump to issue a midnight tirade attacking his longstanding nemesis.
In Ohio, where the Daily Beast spent the weekend on the campaign trail, enthusiastic crowds queued up for hours, with lines stretching around several downtown blocks, to get into the Cleveland Public Auditorium, which has a capacity of 10,000.
In Detroit, more than 4,300 supporters packed a school gymnasium as Obama raged against the administration’s lawlessness, corruption, and economic failures. He also accused Republicans of trying to smear Democrats as “radicals, communists, jihadists, woke police.”
“We have seen this movie before, I starred in it,” Obama said, pushing back against attacks on El-Sayed that echoed the smears once directed at Obama himself.
A CNN/SSN survey conducted in June had Obama holding a 57 percent favorable rating among Americans surveyed, compared with 34 percent for Trump.
In an open-ended question asking which president they admired most, 30 percent named Obama, compared with 19 percent who named Trump—an 11-point gap.
Another UMASS/YouGov poll from earlier this year had Obama leading Trump by 23 percentage points in favorability.
Among independents, only 31 percent viewed Trump favorably, while 68 percent viewed him unfavorably.
“I wouldn’t be surprised if this margin has actually grown a little, as President Trump has been even less popular than he was at the start of this year,” Enten said.
The figures may partly explain Trump’s ongoing rage against Obama, such as the midnight Truth Social post he issued over the weekend.
The lengthy Truth Social post slammed Obama as a “grossly incompetent President”; resurrected Hillary Clinton and Kamala Harris’s election defeats, and branded Michigan’s Democratic nominee Abdul El-Sayed a “Fake Doctor” and “Jihadist” who hates “Jews and Blacks and AMERICANS and TRUMP.”
“He said that Crooked Hillary Clinton was going to WIN, he campaigned hard for her, and she lost in all directions and ways. He then campaigned full out for Kamala, and likewise, she lost,” Trump wrote in a 12:42 a.m. post.
The post came not long after Obama had also unleashed a blistering attack on the administration, accusing the president of enriching himself and mocking the 80-year-old’s vanity projects.
“He’s got the White House looking like Saddam Hussein opened a cheesecake factory!” he said to roars of laughter.
Obama delivered the remarks Saturday at a rally in support of Democratic gubernatorial candidate Amy Acton, a former top health director who was the target of a vicious MAGA attack ad, and former Sen. Sherrod Brown, who is trying to unseat Ohio’s GOP incumbent, former college football player, and object of Trump’s affection, Jon Husted.
