About six in ten American voters think Barack Obama lies to the country on important matters some or most of the time, according to a Fox News poll released Wednesday.
Thirty-seven percent think Obama lies “most of the time,” while another 24 percent say he lies “some of the time.” Twenty percent of voters say “only now and then” and 15 percent “never.”
Click here for the poll results.
President Obama has been accused by political opponents and media fact-checkers alike of telling falsehoods. Frequently cited: His repeated claim that under Obamacare “If you like your plan, you can keep it” and his insistence that “the day after Benghazi happened, I acknowledged that this was an act of terrorism.”
The number of voters saying Obama lies “most of the time” includes 13 percent of Democrats. It also includes 12 percent of blacks, 16 percent of liberals, 31 percent of unmarried women and 34 percent of those under age 30 — all key Obama constituencies.
Yet some of those groups are also among those most likely to say Obama “never” lies to the country on important matters: blacks (37 percent), Democrats (31 percent), liberals (28 percent) and women (19 percent).
The poll also asks about the trustworthiness of a few possible 2016 presidential candidates. For comparison, about half of voters think former Sec. of State Hillary Clinton (54 percent) and former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush (49 percent) are honest and trustworthy, while fewer think the same of New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie (41 percent).
On a more positive note for the White House, Obama’s overall job performance rating has improved. The new poll finds that 42 percent of voters approve of the job he’s doing, while 51 percent disapprove. That means he’s underwater by nine percentage points.
Last month the president was in negative territory by 13 points with a 40-53 percent rating (March 23-25).
Approval of the president is up six points among independents and now stands at 32 percent. Obama was near record-low approval among independents last month (26 percent). He also improved four points among Democrats and now stands at 80 percent among his party faithful.
How voters feel about Obama as a person closely matches his job ratings: 45 percent have a favorable opinion of him, while 51 percent have an unfavorable view. A year ago those numbers were reversed: 52 percent favorable, 46 percent unfavorable (April 2013).
The Fox News poll is based on landline and cell phone interviews with 1,012 randomly chosen registered voters nationwide and was conducted under the joint direction of Anderson Robbins Research (D) and Shaw & Company Research (R) from April 13-15, 2014. The full poll has a margin of sampling error of plus or minus three percentage points.
By Dana Blanton
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