Donald Trump is favored by voters on only one major issue, polls indicate: the economy. On all other concerns facing the country, voters prefer Hillary Clinton, who accordingly has a large lead in the polls.
Across a range of polls conducted since the last debate, voters say the economy and job creation are the top issues they care about and that they want the next president to address. Trump, a businessman who has been in the news for decades for his real estate deals and reality shows, has a small edge over Clinton on that question, even as he is at a major disadvantage on almost all others.
In a Fox News poll released Tuesday, for example, likely voters said they preferred Trump on the issue of the economy, their top issue, 50-44 percent. They favored Clinton on every other issue, including immigration, foreign policy and making decisions about using nuclear weapons, where Clinton had a 25-point lead. Even on the topic of managing Social Security and Medicare, an issue closely related to the broader topic of the economy, Clinton is favored.
Similarly, a Washington Post/ABC News poll conducted last week showed Trump with a 1 percentage point advantage over Clinton on the economy, which again was the top concern of voters. Voters showed narrow preferences for Clinton on handling terrorism and immigration, but big preferences for the former secretary of state on ethics, international affairs and women’s rights.
Other national polls, such as ones commissioned by Bloomberg and NBC/Wall Street Journal, found the same results: Voters say they think Trump would do a better job on the economy and that the economy is the most important concern they have, but they prefer Clinton on almost every other issue and say they will vote for her.
There are some exceptions. Voters appear to think that Trump would be more likely to change Washington, and the NBC/Wall Street Journal indicates that voters like Trump’s criticisms of trade deals enough to trust him to handle U.S. interests in trade negotiations.
Trump’s campaign cannot take much reassurance from the fact that voters seem to trust him more than Clinton to create jobs and expand the economy. Polls also showed that voters favored Mitt Romney on the economy even as they chose President Obama for re-election in 2012.
