At President Joe Biden’s State of the Union address last week, the back-and-forth between Biden and his Republican critics often took center stage, but Americans at home were less worried about the political theatrics and more about their own family budgets.
That’s according to a new poll conducted by HarrisX for Deseret News in the days following Biden’s address to the country. As it turns out, Biden still has some work to do to convince voters he has a handle on inflation, and they wanted to hear more from him on the subject.
When voters were asked if they believed Biden’s claim that inflation has fallen every month for the past six months, only 38% said they found that somewhat or very believable, while 52% said they found that claim very or somewhat unbelievable. When respondents were asked what they wished Biden focused on more in his speech, inflation was their first choice, with 32% choosing that option. The economy came in second, with just over a quarter choosing that option, and immigration ranked third.
Voters were much less interested in hearing about the Jan. 6 insurrection, the U.S. withdrawal from Afghanistan or tech industry layoffs, which all ranked at or near the bottom of the list.
A little under half of Americans said they watched Biden’s speech. Democrats, men, millennials and baby boomers were more likely to say they watched it, while Republicans and independent voters, women and Gen X’ers were more likely to say they skipped it.
Poll respondents didn’t find it hard to believe when Biden said over 8,000 human smugglers have been arrested and 23,000 pounds of fentanyl have been seized in the last few months at the nation’s southern border, with 57% finding that claim believable.
They also believed some of Biden’s more positive claims — including that unemployment is near a record low for Black and Hispanic workers, that gas prices are down and small business creation is up.
On the flip side, Biden’s claim that the federal deficit has fallen by $1.7 trillion since he was elected was deemed “unbelievable” by poll respondents.
Last fall, Biden received three “Pinocchios” from The Washington Post’s fact checker for making a similar claim, since when he uses this line he omits the important context that the federal budget grew significantly in the year before he was elected because of the COVID-19 pandemic, and was projected to shrink in its aftermath. Biden actually increased spending over projections in both of his first two years in office, so the deficit came down less than expected.
“Biden is bragging about reducing budget deficits even as he increased the national debt about $500 billion more than originally projected,” the Post’s Glenn Kessler wrote last September.
Likely for similar reasons, voters were also wary of Biden’s claims that his administration created more jobs in two years than most administrations have in four.
Almost half of Americans said they thought Biden has been successful in making progress on his policy agenda, with 49% saying he has and 40% saying he hasn’t. Strong majorities of Democratic (78%) and independent voters (57%) said they felt Biden has been successful, whether they agreed with his policy priorities or not.