A majority of Florida voters believe President Donald Trump was too slow in responding to the novel coronavirus pandemic, a new poll found.
The latest Fox News survey published Thursday revealed that 55 percent of Floridians believed the White House was too slow to respond to the COVID-19 outbreak.
A little more than four-in-ten (41 percent) said the Trump administration responded with “appropriate speed” when the U.S. first learned about the virus. The remaining four percent said they didn’t know where they came down on the issue.
Asked whether they approved or disapproved of President Trump’s response to the coronavirus outbreak, Florida voters were split almost equally.
A plurality of 49 percent said they disapproved of his handling of the pandemic, while 48 percent said they approved of the commander-in-chief’s response.
Fox News pollsters also found that three quarters of the state were concerned about catching the novel coronavirus, with 75 percent saying they were either “somewhat” or “very” worried about becoming infected.
A similar number (74 percent) of Florida voters feared that the ongoing pandemic and coronavirus shutdowns would lead to economic hardship for them and their families.
But on the economy, President Trump had a net positive approval rating of 11 percent. In spite of rapidly rising jobless claims over the last five weeks, 53 percent of Florida voters said they approved of his handling of the economy, while just 42 percent disapproved.
When they were asked for their opinions on President Trump’s overall performance in the Oval Office, 51 percent said they either “strongly” or “somewhat” approved of the job he was doing.
Yet his net positive approval rating in the state did not translate in head-to-head polling against former Vice President Joe Biden.
Asked who they would vote for were an election held that day, 46 percent said they would back Biden and 43 percent opted for the president, putting the result within the polls margin of error.
The former vice president’s lead was partly driven by a 12-point lead among women, as well an 11-point lead among Independent voters in the state.
“The discrepancy between the approval number and the vote is telling,” Republican pollster Daron Shaw told Fox News. He added that the split between President Trump’s approval rating and his head-to-head performance against Biden “suggests some may be okay with what Trump’s doing, but dislike how he handles himself.”
President Trump won the Florida vote in 2016, beating the Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton by just 1.2 percentage points, and a little more than 100,000 votes.
The Fox News poll interviewed 1,004 Florida voters between April 18 and 21 and was conducted by Braun Research. Its margin of error stands at 3 percentage points.
