Donald Trump's inaugural speech polled well, but not as well as predecessors'

During an interview with ABC News’ David Muir, President Donald Trump -- as he has been known to do -- took the opportunity to tout some of his poll numbers.

"A poll just came out on my inauguration speech which was extraordinary that people loved it," Trump said Jan. 25, 2017. "Loved and liked. And it was an extraordinary poll."

So, is he right? We took a closer look.

When we contacted the White House, they told us that the poll in question was the Politico/Morning Consult poll released on Jan. 25, five days after the inauguration. The poll surveyed 1,922 registered voters, with a sampling margin of error of plus or minus two percentage points.

The relevant question was, "Based on what you have seen, read or heard recently about Donald Trump’s inauguration speech, would you say it was excellent, good, only fair or poor?" The question was only asked of the 1,762 people who said they watched the address, which the pollster said was "a sample that’s slightly more Republican than the overall poll, although (it) still skews Democratic."

The results? A plurality -- 49 percent -- thought Trump’s speech was "excellent" or "good." By comparison, 39 percent thought the speech was either fair or poor.

So, Trump has a point: In isolation, at least, that’s a pretty good score. It’s also a similar result to another poll that asked essentially the same question.

Gallup asked, "Based on what you have heard or read, how would you rate Donald Trump's inauguration speech? Would you rate it as -- excellent, good, just okay, poor or terrible?" Gallup surveyed 508 adults, with a margin of sampling error of plus or minus five percentage points.

The poll found that 53 percent thought the speech was "excellent" or "good," while 42 percent thought it was "just okay," "poor," or "terrible."

So both surveys found positive responses outpacing negative responses by about 10 percentage points, with positive responses accounting for either a majority or nearly a majority.

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The one caveat we’ll mention is that Trump’s showing wasn’t as positive as that of other recent presidents.

Gallup has asked this question for the previous three inaugural addresses -- George W. Bush’s in 2005 and Barack Obama’s in 2009 and 2013.

Trump’s "excellent plus good" score of 53 percent trailed all three. The score for Bush in 2005 was 62 percent, while Obama received 81 percent in 2009 and 65 percent in 2013. In addition, Trump got the worst-ever "terrible" score -- 14 percent, which was twice as high as the previous record, for Obama’s second inaugural speech.

Our ruling

Trump said, "A poll just came out on my inauguration speech. … People loved it. Loved and liked."

He has a point that in both the Politico/Morning Consult poll and the Gallup poll, favorable opinions outpaced unfavorable opinions by double-digit margins. However, it’s worth noting that Trump’s positive score in the Gallup poll was between 9 and 28 points lower than the scores in the previous three inaugural addresses. We rate the statement Mostly True.

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"A poll just came out on my inauguration speech. … People loved it. Loved and liked."

Donald Trump

President

an interview with ABC;s David Muir

Wednesday, January 25, 2017

-01/-25/2017

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