Trump Hits Record 62 Percent Disapproval Over Inflation and Iran as Allies Waver

Amid turmoil abroad and sticker shock at home, New Yorkers may feel keenly the national mood turning against the president.

The silhouette of a gasoline price sign flickering above a Bronx filling station tells a plain tale: at $5.23 a gallon, New Yorkers are reacquainted with the pain of inflation where it pinches most. As petrol and utility bills lurch ever higher, a new survey finds that discontent with President Donald Trump has reached an unprecedented pitch. At 62%, national disapproval lies higher than at any point in his turbulent administration, and the city’s straphangers and small business owners are among those most acutely aware of the consequences.

The poll, conducted by ABC News, the Washington Post, and Ipsos, offers a portrait of a nation ill at ease. Fully three-quarters of respondents judge Mr Trump to have mishandled the rising cost of living; nearly as many single out inflation as a personal threat. On the international front, two-thirds give a thumbs-down to his stewardship of the grinding war with Iran, while a comparable majority fret over deteriorating ties with traditional allies. If the White House wagered that foreign adventure would distract from nagging economic woes, the bet looks poorly placed.

In New York City, where rising costs and global connections are both daily bread and butter, the effects are especially pronounced. Rents, already burdensome, appear ever more so as food and energy prices follow suit. Restaurant owners in Queens complain of thinning profit margins; apartment dwellers in the outer boroughs eye their Con Edison bills with undisguised anxiety. The perennial grumble—“If you can make it here, you can make it anywhere”—now comes tinged with ironic despair.

Political repercussions are fast following. Democrats have seized on the discontent, sharpening attacks on the administration’s competence. Even some city Republicans, nervously eyeing re-election, voice concern—albeit sotto voce—about being pulled down by the president’s unpopularity. Local politicians, from councilmembers to congressional contenders, have recast their campaign scripts around groceries, rent, and the White House’s perceived abdication.

New York’s economy, still recovering from pandemic-era scars, finds the inflationary tide hard to stomach. Urban businesses, heavily reliant on imported goods and energy, chafe at costs that eat into both profits and payrolls. Nonprofits, too, report higher demand—as more working families seek food assistance and public housing applications soar. For city government, this foreshadows a punishing budget season, as wage pressures and pension liabilities mount.

Socially, the city’s legendary resilience faces new tests. The prospect of military conflict in the Middle East has stirred memories of the post-9/11 years when global instability cast its pall over Wall Street and outer-borough immigrant enclaves alike. The latest fallings-out with European and NATO allies, coupled with Mr Trump’s decision to withdraw 5,000 soldiers from Germany, leaves city-based diplomats and think-tankers muttering about diminished American stature. In cosmopolitan corners from Jackson Heights to the Upper West Side, anxiety grows that Washington’s frayed ties abroad will echo close to home—in tourism, in investment, and in the city’s global brand.

How does the situation compare outside the five boroughs? Inflation is not, of course, uniquely a New York phenomenon. Los Angeles, Miami, and Houston confront similar pressures, though Gotham’s higher baseline for rents and transit fares means its pinch is sharper. Nationally, the 3.5% “core” inflation rate recorded in March, the highest in two years, is being watched warily—not just by households but by credit markets and the Federal Reserve. The war with Iran, meanwhile, has stoked fears in oil-importing cities everywhere, though few American metropolises bear the brunt of reputational risk quite as New York does.

Internationally, Mr Trump’s struggles are hardly sui generis. European leaders, themselves lashed by voters over energy prices, raise eyebrows at America’s capacity to hold alliances together. Yet while other governments may shuffle or tack, the president’s particularly combative tone—publicly scolding allies from London to Berlin—exacerbates rifts that may outlast this administration. New Yorkers, heirs to a city built on trade and migration, have cause to worry when multilateral institutions wobble.

The global becomes local

Opinion polls can be fickle lodestars, but the numbers in this latest survey suggest that Mr Trump faces not simply another bout of partisan angst, but a structural shift in public attitudes. The White House’s attempts to blame global forces or point to progress in Iranian negotiations convince few outside the base. That the president himself has admitted doubts about reaching a conclusive settlement with Tehran does little to inspire confidence.

Should the economic anxiety persist or worsen, New York’s budget-makers—and its social compact—will encounter further strains. Labour unions are already agitating for cost-of-living adjustments; tenants’ groups for rent caps; transit advocates for more funding in an environment of shrinking state and federal support. Meanwhile, the city’s European partners may grow yet more distant, amplifying the risk of a puny recovery were conflict to escalate.

The larger lesson may be that New York, long a beneficiary and symbol of the liberal international order, finds itself buffeted when that order falters. National leadership that prizes bombast over cooperation, or transient popularity over long-term stability, leaves global cities like New York more exposed than most.

We reckon the disquiet is likely to persist, at least through the election season and, if the international situation remains febrile, beyond it. The city has weathered worse, but for now it trudges forward, both stage and spectator to the national drama.

■