Most Americans, particularly most Republicans, disapprove of President Joe Biden’s handling of Ukraine, according to recent polls. In a poll in late March, only 36% said Biden was doing a good job specifically on Ukraine.
So what do people actually want us to do about Russian President Vladimir Putin’s invasion of Ukraine? More than 60% say they would give “Ukraine some, but not all, of the support it wants, in order to avoid a larger military conflict between Russia and the United States.” Only 17% would be willing to risk “wider conflict” between Russia and U.S. by giving Ukraine “all the support it wants.”
So the Adam Kinzinger-Michael McCaul slice of the population is pretty small. Most people, including 60% of Republicans, basically want Biden to do something pretty close to what he’s doing now. Although 46% of Republicans say Biden should “do more … when it comes to the war in Ukraine,” the most substantive questions yield answers along the line of arm Ukraine, sanction Russia, but don’t get us into war.
And again, that is, more or less, what Biden is doing. Biden, unlike former Presidents Barack Obama, George W. Bush, and Bill Clinton, seems to have landed on foreign policy where most of the country is. We are not the world’s policeman, but we are not afraid to intervene in small ways to help the good guy against the bad guy is.
But then, why is Biden’s polling on the war so poor?
Two possible explanations come to mind, both of which might be at play here to some degree. The first is that people realize Biden could have done a lot more before the war started to deter Russia from starting it at all. In other words, they approve of what he’s doing now, but they see the war as a result of his reluctance to send appropriate military aid to Ukraine until it was almost too late. Regional allies had to take the lead to help Ukraine because Biden wouldn’t do it and was in fact, metaphorically, dragged into doing it kicking and screaming.
The other possible factor reveals more about the limits of issue-polling than it does about Ukraine or the public’s views on war. People who already don’t like Biden are probably going to dislike him in everything he does. People who answer questions about Biden’s handling of the war aren’t really talking about Biden’s handling of the war. They’re talking about the fact that the war is bad — war is always bad — and more importantly that they don’t like Biden generally.
Biden’s approval ratings overall basically match his approval ratings on Ukraine. So what shows up in polls as disapproval of Biden’s handling of Ukraine is probably best understood as general disapproval of Biden as president.
If inflation comes to an end and the economy stays strong and crime dips, then polls on Biden’s handling of Ukraine will probably improve somewhat, even if the war in Ukraine remains just as atrocious and intractable.
