By Jason Lange
WASHINGTON (Reuters) – Americans see inflation as the leading issue President-elect Donald Trump should tackle during his first 100 days in office, according to a Reuters/Ipsos published on Tuesday.
Some 35% of respondents in the three-day poll, which closed on Sunday, picked inflation as the area Trump should focus on, compared to 30% who said immigration and 27% who said jobs and the general economy.
Another 23% said Trump, who will be sworn into office on Jan. 20, should focus on unifying the country. Smaller shares said he should focus on taxes, crime or foreign conflicts.
A Republican, Trump defeated Democrat Kamala Harris in the Nov. 5 election and his party won control of the U.S. Senate and held its grip on the U.S. House of Representatives. Trump has vowed to use the Republican sweep to enact significant policy changes, including new tariffs on imports, tax cuts and the mass deportation of immigrants.
Economists say an aggressive tariff regime – Trump has pledged heavy tariffs on Chinese imports – could push prices higher as companies pass on to consumers the costs of tariffs. That might mean rekindling the higher rates of inflation that plagued the administration of Democratic President Joe Biden and helped Trump win this year’s election.
Inflation surged in 2021 and 2022 as global supply chains were disrupted by the COVID-19 pandemic. Price increases have moderated more recently but the annual rate of inflation remains elevated.
Only a marginal 1% of survey respondents said Trump should focus on international trade and tariffs. The poll, which surveyed 1,014 U.S. adults nationwide, had a margin of error of about 3 percentage points.
Republicans in the poll were most interested in Trump focusing on immigration, with 56% of them picking that option compared to 11% of Democrats. The largest share of Democrats – 33% – said Trump should focus on unifying the country. Some 12% of Republicans said the same.
The poll depicted mild optimism taking hold among Republicans since Trump’s election. Some 30% of Republicans said the country was heading in the right direction, compared to 3% in a Reuters/Ipsos poll conducted Oct. 25-27, just before the election. Only 8% of Democrats said the country was on the right track in the last poll, down from 29% in October.
Trump is poised to enter office without a high level of popularity, an indication of America’s heavily polarized politics. Some 44% of respondents in the poll said they had a favorable view of Trump, compared to 51% who had an unfavorable view of him.
(Reporting by Jason Lange; Editing by Scott Malone and Howard Goller)
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