Poll: Obama approval at 44 percent

A new Quinnipiac University poll finds President Obama’s approval rating at the lowest point of his presidency. The poll found 44 percent of voters approve of the job Obama is doing, while 48 percent disapprove.

Among independents the gap is even wider — 52 percent disapprove to just 38 percent who approve of Obama’s performance.

A Q-poll in May found 48 percent of voters approving of the president, while 43 disapproved. Voters disapprove of the president’s handling of almost every major issue polled, from the economy to the Gulf oil spill to illegal immigration. Voters disapprove of Obama’s handling of the economy 56 percent to 39 percent. On illegal immigration, voters disapprove by a margin of 58-30 percent.

Against an unnamed Republican candidate for president in 2012, Obama is behind 39 percent to 36 percent, with 13 percent of respondents saying it would depend on who the GOP candidate is. 

“In politics a month is a lifetime, and we have 28 months until November of 2012. But politicians with reelect numbers at 40 percent bear watching,” said Peter Brown, assistant director of the Quinnipiac University Polling Institute. 

One piece of good news for the president out of these latest numbers — by a margin of 42 percent to 32 percent, voters said Obama has been a better president than George W. Bush.