A new poll suggests that when it comes to public opinion of Donald Trump, there are two Colorados.
Magellan Strategies, a right-leaning firm out of Boulder County and one of the only reliable and consistent sources of statewide polling data in the state, today published the results of a survey of 500 likely Colorado voters, whom they contacted by phone last week.
The survey, which has a roughly 4.5-percent margin of error, shows Democrats and Republicans have almost reached peak polarization in their assessments of the president.
In response to the question, “Do you approve or disapprove of the job Donald Trump is doing as President?”, 96 percent of Colorado Republicans polled said they approved.
Trump job-performance approval rating among Democrats was 2 percent.
The partisan chasm on Trump in Colorado is as profound as any statistically significant survey has reported since he was elected.
A University of Colorado poll from January showed 79 percent of Republicans approved of Trump’s performance at the time, while 95 percent of Democrats disapproved. Magellan’s new poll indicates more Colorado Republicans have since migrated to the president’s corner.
David Flaherty, CEO of Magellan, said he’s not surprised by the results.
“The rank-and-file Republicans in the state of Colorado will absolutely stick by the president, thick and thin, no matter what,” he said. “Democrats are absolutely united in their hatred of the president. It’s crystal clear.”
In Colorado, the numbers of registered Republicans, Democrats and unaffiliated voters are nearly even. Flaherty said the more useful exercise in examining the Colorado view of Trump is to look at how independent voters feel.
Trump’s approval rating in that category is just 32 percent, the new poll showed.
Overall, that leaves Trump’s statewide approval rating at 44 percent in the survey, with 50 percent disapproving and 6 percent identifying as “unsure.”
Trump lost the state in 2016 to Hillary Clinton by five points, a split reflected in the new poll, which has Trump six points underwater in Colorado.
Nationally, the approve/disapprove split on Trump stands at 42/52 today, according to the ABC News-owned polling aggregation site FiveThirtyEight.
Daniel Cole, spokesman for the state Republican Party, said the Magellan poll confirms that, for all the talk of so-called never-Trumpers within the GOP, the president gets high marks within his own party.
“Somebody might know a bunch of Republicans who don’t like Trump — there are always going to be people in the party who don’t agree with its standard bearers,” Cole said. “But I don’t think they’re a significant factor. Trump is extremely popular within the Republican Party.”
The poll’s complete results — available here — show that Trump himself is far more polarizing to Coloradans than either of the state’s gubernatorial candidates, Democrat Jared Polis and Republican Walker Stapleton. Respondents were asked whether they have “favorable” views of the candidates, and for both, just 36 percent said no. For Polis, 45 percent answered yes, and for Stapleton, 42 percent answered yes.
Coloradans on the whole also view the Democratic and Republican parties favorably, the poll shows.
Flaherty theorized that the recent, controversial confirmation of Brett Kavanaugh to the U.S. Supreme Court may be one reason his firm’s survey shows Republicans and Democrats in the state seem to be as apart as ever on Trump. Asked whether they approve of Kavanaugh’s confirmation, 83 percent of Republican respondents said yes, while 83 percent of Democratic respondents said no.
