polling

June 18 (UPI) — Sen. Elissa Slotkin, D-Mich., introduced a bill Thursday called the Protect Our Polls Act that would block the president from sending soldiers or federal agents to voting sites during elections.

The bill comes after President Donald Trump said he wouldn’t rule out sending the National Guard or Immigrations and Customs Enforcement to polling places in November.

“I’d do anything necessary to make sure we have honest elections,” The Hill reported Trump told reporters in May.

Slotkin said the bill would prevent Trump from “weaponizing our military and armed federal officers to interfere in our elections.”

The legislation, if passed, would require approval from Congress before a president could send uniformed military or federal law enforcement to polling sites. It would also require 48 hours’ notice to lawmakers, intel, legal justification and evidence that proves a state can’t handle a threat on its own.

The bill is backed by senators Tammy Baldwin, Wis.; Ruben Gallego, Ariz.; Mark Kelly, Ariz.; Amy Klobuchar, Minn.; Alex Padilla, Calif.; Jacky Rosen, Nev.; and Raphael Warnock, Ga.

In a statement, White House spokesperson Abigail Jackson told NBC, “If Democrats really cared about securing our elections, they would pass the SAVE America Act which includes commonsense election integrity measures supported by the vast majority of Americans.”

Federal and state laws already ban deployment of troops and agents from elections, except “to repel armed enemies of the United States.”

“The idea that a president would send troops or armed agents to polling places to intimidate voters is un-American and illegal,” Kelly said in a statement. “Federal law has protected polling places from military interference since the Civil War for a reason. President Trump has made clear he thinks he can ignore those limits. We’re making sure he can’t.”

Secretary of Homeland Security Markwayne Mullin said in March that he wouldn’t send agents to polling places without good reason.

“The only reason why my officers would be there is if there was a specific threat for them to be there, not for intimidation,” Mullin said. “There will be a reason for us to be there, and it’ll be known why we’re there.”

WASHINGTON — Independents have grown increasingly unhappy with President Trump during his second term, a new AP-NORC polling analysis finds, particularly those without a college degree.

The analysis from researchers at The Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research shows that while about half of independents without a college education had a positive view of Trump around the 2024 election, his approval with that group fell to about one-quarter this spring. That shift has erased the large education gap that existed among independents in the months before Trump took office for his second term, with independents now holding similarly negative views of the president regardless of their level of education.

The analysis was conducted by aggregating nearly two dozen AP-NORC polls conducted between July 2024 and April 2026, allowing for a deeper look at how support for Trump changed during several distinct periods, including the last six months of 2024, the first 100 days of Trump’s presidency, the summer of 2025 when the One Big Beautiful Bill passed, last fall’s government shutdown and the beginning of the Iran war.

The compiled polling shows a steady decline among independents throughout Trump’s second term. His standing has also dropped among several small but important groups that moved toward him in the 2024 presidential election, including Black and Hispanic independents.

More Americans than ever consider themselves independents, and they are among the groups that shifted toward Trump in the 2024 presidential election. Any erosion in that support could signal trouble for Trump and Republicans headed into the midterm elections, which are often seen as reflection of how voters feel about their governing party.

Tafari Torres, a senior research associate at NORC who co-authored the analysis, noted that while Democrats’ and Republicans’ views of Trump have held largely steady in his second term, independents’ opinions are still moving.

“Independents are, broadly, the people who are reacting to the events and dropping in their support,” he said.

Dramatic declines during Trump’s first 100 days

Trump’s return to the White House was in part fueled by independent voters who saw him as the stronger candidate on key issues like the economy. The new analysis, which looks at Trump’s favorability and presidential approval ratings, shows that once he took the helm, their views quickly soured.

Independents without a college degree had a much more positive view of Trump than college-educated independents did during and shortly after the 2024 election, but that shifted in the first few months of his term. Positive views of Trump among independents without a college degree fell from 48% in the months before he returned to office to 31% in polling conducted during Trump’s first 100 days back in office. Those warm views declined even further, to about one-quarter, during the government shutdown and the early months of 2026.

Only about 3 in 10 college-educated independents, by contrast, had a positive view of Trump before he returned to office, making their drop to about one-quarter much less dramatic.

“The decline among no-college independents was steeper and it was greater than the slight decline in college independents,” said Sean Collins, a research associate at NORC who co-authored the analysis. “That was surprising, especially given, when you think of Trump’s coalitions, those without college degrees is usually one of the ones that that stands out.”

Hispanic, younger independents grow disenchanted

Americans without a college degree have long been a key part of Trump’s coalition. But Trump also won in 2024 by making gains among groups that tend to support Democrats, including Hispanic adults.

About 4 in 10 independent voters — 42% — voted for Trump in 2024, up from 37% in the 2020 presidential election. Independent voters without a college degree were a little more likely to back Trump over former Vice President Kamala Harris in the last election, according to AP VoteCast, and Hispanic independents were about evenly split between the two.

The picture looks much bleaker for the president now.

Nearly half of Hispanic independents — 46% — saw Trump favorably in the polling conducted around the presidential election. His approval among these adults dropped quickly in his second term, falling as low as 15% during last fall’s government shutdown before landing around one-quarter in the spring.

Younger independents also became less supportive of the president, while independents age 60 and older remained mostly stable. Other AP-NORC polling has pointed to Trump losing ground among younger Republicans over inflation concerns and Hispanic Americans growing increasingly discontented.

“The gains Trump appeared to make during the election, I don’t know if they’re sticking around. He’s experienced some significant shifts among those people,” Torres said. “From our research, they don’t appear to be permanent gains.”

The economy is frustrating many independents

Polling suggests that the economy is at the root of many Americans’ frustrations with Trump, including independents.

About half of independents who supported Trump in 2024 said inflation was the single most important factor for their vote, AP VoteCast found, and most expressed high levels of concern about the cost of food and gas.

More than a year into Trump’s second term, inflation remains high, fueled by gas prices that remain elevated as the Iran war continues. An AP-NORC poll conducted in April found that about 3 in 10 independents were “extremely” or “very” concerned about being able to afford groceries in the last few months, and a similar share were worried about being able to afford gas.

The analysis found that Americans’ views of the U.S. economy tend to align with their view of the president. Those with negative views of the country’s economy tended to have negative views of Trump, and about 8 in 10 independents described the U.S. economy this spring as poor.

The latest AP-NORC polling from May found that only about 3 in 10 independents approve of how Trump is handling the economy, in line with the roughly 3 in 10 who said that at the beginning of his second term. The April poll found only about 1 in 10 independents — 12% — approved of how Trump was handling the cost of living.

This AP-NORC analysis of 4,836 independents was conducted over 21 AP-NORC surveys, blocked into five time periods before and during President Donald Trump’s second term. Independents are classified as panelists who do not select that they identify with or lean toward either the Democratic or Republican Party.

Sanders writes for the Associated Press.

Police on Friday secured remaining ballot boxes at a polling station in southern Seoul, two days after protesters gathered to prevent election officials from removing them in protest of a shortage of ballots during the June 3 local elections.

Police officials broke through a crowd of protesters to remove the two ballot boxes at the polling station in Jamsil, Songpa Ward, after deploying around 1,000 officers to the scene earlier in the day to break up the rally.

The boxes, said to contain around 2,000 ballots, were transported to a ballot counting center at nearby Olympic Park.

Authorities said multiple people suffered minor injuries at the polling station and the vote counting center, where protesters also gathered to demand election officials to stop the count.

The polling station was one of over a dozen locations in Seoul that experienced ballot shortages Wednesday, prompting the temporary suspension of voting at the affected stations.

Angry protesters gathered at the Jamsil polling station, accusing the election watchdog of having committed election fraud and blocking election officials from removing the ballot boxes.

The standoff had prevented the National Election Commission from completing vote counting and officially declaring election winners in the affected areas.

A group of protesters attempted to block the police from entering the polling station, resulting in physical clashes as officers dragged them out. Some protesters claimed the police used excessive force.

Fire authorities said they had treated six people for minor injuries at the polling station and the vote counting center since Thursday night.

Three of them, including a woman in her 40s who complained of a headache, were sent to the hospital.

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June 3 (Asia Today) — The People Power Party protested Wednesday after voting was temporarily halted at some polling stations in Seoul’s Songpa Ward because of ballot shortages, calling the incident “a serious violation of voters’ political rights.”

Chung Hee-yong, the party’s secretary-general, held an emergency news conference and criticized the National Election Commission over the incident.

“This is a shocking incident that should not and must not happen at a polling site in South Korea in 2026,” Chung said. “It goes beyond simple lack of election preparation and reflects a deplorable failure to fulfill the duty of election management.”

Chung called for “strong and immediate action” by the election commission.

“First, swift measures must be taken so that citizens who could not vote because of ballot shortages can exercise their voting rights,” he said.

Song Eon-seog, the party’s floor leader, also issued an emergency statement.

“We are receiving absurd reports that citizens in Seoul cannot vote because ballots are unavailable,” Song said. “Seoul citizens, you must not give up voting under any circumstances. Even if it is difficult, please wait calmly and make sure to vote.”

Song said the situation infringed on citizens’ right to participate in elections.

“We strongly urge the National Election Commission to guarantee voting rights so that citizens who waited can vote even after 6 p.m.,” he said. “Transfer the ballots quickly.”

Song also said the party had received reports that voting was taking place at several polling stations nationwide without People Power Party observers present.

“Is this the 19th century? Does this make any sense?” he said. “As soon as the election ends, we will immediately push for a fact-finding investigation into this incident and make sure those responsible are held accountable.”

Bae Hyun-jin, chairwoman of the People Power Party’s Seoul chapter, also held an emergency news conference.

“A shortage of ballots in an election is not a simple mistake. It proves that the basic election management system, the foundation of democracy, has completely collapsed,” Bae said.

She criticized the election commission for saying the shortages resulted from a sudden increase in voter turnout.

“The commission responded as if it were nothing serious,” Bae said. “We will continue to demand measures to prevent a recurrence and disciplinary action against those responsible for the election management failure that violated the sovereign act of Seoul citizens.”

The People Power Party said it had identified eight polling stations affected by ballot shortages: Munjeong 2-dong No. 2, Jamsil 2-dong No. 6, Jamsil 7-dong No. 2, Jamsil 4-dong No. 5, Garak 2-dong Nos. 3 and 7, Cheongdam-dong No. 4 and Guui 3-dong No. 6 in Gwangjin Ward.

— Reported by Asia Today; translated by UPI

© Asia Today. Unauthorized reproduction or redistribution prohibited.

Original Korean report: https://www.asiatoday.co.kr/kn/view.php?key=20260603010001076

WASHINGTON — Mired in a persistent cost of living crisis and an unpopular war with Iran, President Trump reached a perilous milestone last week, registering an approval rating of 34% in a top-tier poll — a record low less than halfway through his second term.

The results mark one of the sharpest polling collapses of any modern president. The data, from the Economist and YouGov, brings Trump back down to his political nadir, matching a number he hasn’t seen since the immediate aftermath of the Jan. 6 attack five years ago.

It follows on several other surveys published in recent days showing the president entering precarious political territory roughly six months ahead of the midterm elections, raising alarm bells in Republican campaign offices across the country over the party’s prospects in the fall.

It has also led pollsters to question long-standing assumptions about the president’s floor of support, wondering whether it is at risk of giving way.

“It’s harder to get lower, but it’s possible depending on what he does,” said Christopher Wlezien, a political scientist at the University of Texas at Austin. “To get that number down, you are going to have to eat into his core.”

Trump’s base of support remains strong, reinforcing a long-standing theory among pollsters that partisanship now serves as a direct proxy for presidential approval. But softening Republican support on specific policy matters — including top voter priorities, such as the economy — have begun raising questions among experts whether further erosion is possible.

A New York Times poll found his approval at 38%, and a Politico poll recorded a similar erosion, driven by a majority of Americans — including 18% of Trump supporters — stating they are financially worse off than they were before he resumed office.

Roughly 2 out of 3 Americans oppose the war Trump started with Iran. And the coalition that swept him back into office — including a surge in support from Latino, independent and young voters — has effectively disappeared.

While the downward trend looks like a story of a presidency in perpetual trouble, political scientists see a more complicated picture.

“Polarization has raised the floor and lowered the ceiling for approval ratings,” said Brandon Rottinghaus, a professor of political science at the University of Houston. “Dramatic swings are less common because approval ratings are now fixed to partisanship.”

The comparison to George W. Bush, whose numbers famously soared after the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks and cratered into the mid-20s after Hurricane Katrina and the Iraq war, is instructive of how polarization has changed in the Trump era.

Bush governed in a country capable of moving together, in favor or against a president, in response to major events. Americans are no longer swayed in that way when it comes to their views of the president, Rottinghaus argues.

“Approval ratings today are increasingly a measure of who the president is rather than what the president does,” he said.

Trump, in his own way, has seemed to nod at this dynamic. When challenged on his standing with the public, or when a Republican lawmaker breaks with him over a policy issue, he has made the argument that he and the MAGA movement are inseparable. In other words, that opposition to any decision he makes is opposition to the movement itself.

“MAGA is me. MAGA loves everything I do, and I love everything I do,” Trump said in a January interview with NBC News when asked if his base supports long-term military interventions abroad.

Rottinghaus compared the questions about presidential approval as the “same as asking whether you’re Republican or not.”

“So why ask it,” he said.

Gallup, the organization that had tracked presidential approval for eight decades, announced earlier this year that it would stop publishing approval ratings of individual political figures, a shift that underscores how the traditional measure of a politician’s popularity has evolved.

When asked about the change, a Gallup spokesperson told the Washington Post at the time that “the context around these measures has changed.”

“They are now widely produced, aggregated and interpreted, and no longer represent an area where Gallup can make its most distinctive contribution,” the spokesperson added.

CHARLESTON, W.Va. — Presenting a utility bill as a valid form of identification at a voting precinct in West Virginia has gone the way of the tavern polling place and the punch-card ballot.

State lawmakers tightened an existing voter identification law by requiring photo ID at the polls, with some exceptions. The law was used for the first time in Tuesday’s primary election, and officials said they’ve seen very few glitches.

“The whole point of the law is just making sure you are who you say you are,” Secretary of State Kris Warner said Monday.

Voters will nominate candidates for U.S. Senate, U.S. House and state legislature. They also will elect two new state Supreme Court justices.

During the in-person early voting period that ended Saturday, Warner said his office hadn’t heard of anyone who demanded to vote without a photo ID. He said the state had asked residents to use photo IDs for the past few elections, so “it was not a big shock that it was now law.”

During his statewide travels over the past two weeks, Warner said he was told of some instances where people returned to their vehicle to retrieve a photo ID after entering a polling place. Another voter used an exception to the law by filling out a form that was verified by a poll worker who has known them for at least six months. There also were exceptions for first-time voters.

Most states either require or request some form of ID for in-person voting at the polls.

Proponents say the West Virginia law will cut down on voter fraud and that a photo ID is already required for everyday tasks such as getting on an airplane or buying alcohol.

The bill sailed through the Republican-supermajority legislature last year. All votes against it were cast by Democrats, some who argued it would suppress access to the polls. State Democratic Party Chair Mike Pushkin said no credible evidence was shown during legislative debate that West Virginia had a widespread problem with ineligible voting. Pushkin said the legislation was “designed more for political messaging than solving actual problems.”

But Warner said it allows senior citizens to use expired driver’s licenses, as long as it was valid on their 65th birthday

“I wanted to make sure it didn’t prevent anyone from voting,” Warner said.

Forms of identification that are no longer accepted at polling places include utility bills, bank statements, hunting and fishing licenses, bank or debit cards, and concealed carry gun permits. Acceptable forms of photo IDs include a driver’s license, U.S. passport, military ID, employee ID issued by a government agency and a student ID from a high school or college.

Monongalia County Clerk Carye Blaney said for several years her county has used an electronic system to scan bar codes on the back of driver’s licenses to check in voters at polling places.

“I think that it makes voters feel more secure, or it confirms for the voters the security of our elections when we are verifying a photo to a person,” Blaney said.

Raby writes for the Associated Press.