Poll: Most see relations with adversaries souring
In general, 39% expect global standing decline
WASHINGTON – A majority of U.S. adults expect America’s relations with foreign adversaries like Russia and North Korea to grow more hostile, according to a new poll, a major shift in public opinion from four years ago under President Donald Trump.
Two years into the Biden administration, 60% of U.S. adults say relations with adversaries will get worse, up from 26% four years ago at the same point in the Trump administration, according to the poll from the Pearson Institute and The Associated PRESS-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research. Just 21% say relationships with allies will deteriorate, down from 46% then.
In general, 39% expect the country’s global standing to worsen, compared with 48% who said that in 2018. The United States’ own sharply divided domestic politics influences views of the country’s standing abroad.
“Those results really, clearly show that it’s hyperpartisanship” affecting how confidently or bleakly, respectively, Democrats and Republicans see the U.S. standing abroad, said Sheila Kohanteb, a political scientist and executive director of the Global Forum at the Chicago-based Pearson Institute for the Study and Resolution of Global Conflicts.
In terms of the opinions that people in the U.S. are expressing on U.S. dealings abroad, the key factor is “political bloc sticking with political bloc,” Kohanteb said.
Four years ago, three-quarters of Democrats expected U.S. global standing to suffer. Now, roughly that same percentage see stability or improvement in the near future. By comparison, about 6 in 10 Republicans predicted improvements in 2018; now that same percentage expect the current administration to stumble.
Other countries are “probably laughing at us, waiting for us to fall apart,” said Kristy Woodard, a 30-year-old Republican in Winston-salem, North Carolina.
“I don’t think we really have allies anymore because the United States is just a joke at this point,” Woodard said.
But David Dvorin, a 49-year-old Democrat in Pittsburgh who works as a price specialist, said Biden was winning respect abroad by rallying international allies to respond to Russian President Vladimir Putin’s invasion of Ukraine.
Still, as Russia amps up its assault on Ukraine, tensions with China grow over Taiwan, and the U.S. confronts North Korea and Iran over those countries’ nuclear programs, similar percentages of Republicans and Democrats say that relationships with adversaries will get worse in the next year.
The Pearson Institute/ap-norc poll also shows strong support for a U.S. foreign policy that protects women and minorities around the world – even though few people think the U.S. is doing a world-beating job of protecting those same interests at home.
The poll of 1,003 adults was conducted Sept. 9-12 using a sample drawn from NORC’S probability-based Amerispeak Panel, which is designed to be representative of the U.S. population. The margin of sampling error for all respondents is plus or minus 4.0 percentage points.