Congressional Dems Remain At Rock Bottom In Eyes Of American Voters

The majority of Americans disapprove of the job Democrats in Congress are doing, according to a Marist/NPR/PBS News poll released Tuesday.

Just 27% of registered voters said they approve of how congressional Democrats are performing in office, down from 39% in Feb. 2024, according to the survey. Meanwhile, the poll found that 58% of voters said they disapprove of congressional Democrats’ leadership, and 15% said they were unsure.

Democrats had almost evenly split views on how Democratic leaders in Congress are doing in office, with 44% saying they approve and 43% saying they disapprove, according to the poll.

Of those surveyed, 36%, including 73% of Republicans, said they approved of how congressional Republicans are doing in office, up from 26% in 2024. Additionally, 52% said they disapprove of congressional Republicans’ leadership, while 12% said they were unsure, according to the survey.

The Marist Poll comes after a slew of surveys that indicate many Americans hold unfavorable views of congressional Democrats’ leadership ahead of the 2026 midterm elections. The Democratic Party is notably aiming to take back control of the House of Representatives in the upcoming midterms.

There have also been recent reports that the Democratic National Committee (DNC) has been facing mounting infightingand declining donations in recent months.

This survey of 1,381 adults was conducted June 23rd through June 25th by the Marist Poll sponsored in partnership with NPR and PBS News. Results for all adults (n=1,381) are statistically significant within plus or minus 2.9 percentage points. Results for registered voters (n=1,206) are statistically significant within plus or minus 3.1 percentage points. The design effect for this survey is 1.18 which has been incorporated in the calculation of all reported margins of error.

The partisan breakdown for this survey among registered voters was 35% Democratic, 34% Republican, and 29% independent.