President Joe Biden will leave office with ratings far more negative than when he started, and a retrospective approval rating lower than any he received during the term.
When Americans look back now on Biden’s presidency, 37% approve of the job he has done over the last four years. That is just below any approval mark he received while in office.
Four years ago, most Americans were optimistic about a Biden presidency and evaluations of him started off on a positive note. His overall approval rating was in the 60s, lifted, in part, by optimism about getting the COVID pandemic under some control. But this was short-lived. After the chaotic U.S. withdrawal from Afghanistan that summer, Mr. Biden’s approval rating declined and dropped even further that fall amid public concerns about inflation. It never recovered.
Mr. Biden’s retrospective approval rating today is lower than Trump’s was when he was leaving office in 2021. It is far lower than other recent Democratic presidents, each of whom left after two terms.
For much of the last few years, Mr. Biden’s approval rating has largely hovered in and around the low 40s.
These low approval ratings extended to his management of specific issues. For most of his presidency, Mr. Biden received negative marks for his handling of key issues such as the economy and inflation — top concerns for Americans.
As he embarked on his reelection campaign, voters repeatedly expressed doubts over whether Mr. Biden had the cognitive health to serve as president. Those doubts grew after a poor presidential debate performance. After that, most didn’t think he should be running for president, including many in his own party.
In July, President Biden stepped aside as the Democratic nominee, but that may have been too late for some. Today, more than half of Democrats think Kamala Harris would have won the presidential election if Mr. Biden had stepped aside sooner, but the public overall doesn’t think the timing of his withdrawal from the race would have mattered.
Over the last four years, Vice President Kamala Harris’ approval rating has tracked closely with that of Mr. Biden’s. Today, she leaves office with 43% of Americans approving of the job she did as vice president over the last four years, higher than Mr. Biden’s approval rating as president.
This CBS News/YouGov survey was conducted with a nationally representative sample of 2,174 U.S. adults interviewed between January 15-17, 2025. The sample was weighted to be representative of adults nationwide according to gender, age, race, and education, based on the U.S. Census American Community Survey and Current Population Survey, as well as 2024 presidential vote. The margin of error is ±2.5 points.
