AP-NORC Poll: About a Quarter of AAPI Adults Approve of Trump Overall, Only 2 in 10 on the Economy Ahead of the Midterms
With the November 3 midterm elections approaching, Asian American, Native Hawaiian and Pacific Islander (AAPI) adults have turned sharply more critical of President Donald Trump and the Republican Party, and the economy sits at the center of their concerns. In a new survey by AAPI Data and The Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research, only about one-quarter of AAPI adults approve of Trump's overall job performance, and approval of his handling of the economy is lower still, at about 2 in 10. The poll interviewed 1,023 AAPI adults between September 8 and 15, with a margin of sampling error of plus or minus 4.7 percentage points.
Economic issues dominate the agenda these voters bring to the election: about 9 in 10 named the economy among the most important issues, about 8 in 10 said the same of the cost of living, and about 7 in 10 said it of health care. Trump's numbers have slipped over the past year — his economic approval among AAPI adults is down about 10 percentage points, and the share who view him favorably has fallen from about 4 in 10 in late 2024 to about 3 in 10 now. Karthick Ramakrishnan, founder and executive director of AAPI Data, said the figures show that the gains Trump made during the 2024 election and in the honeymoon period that followed have now largely disappeared.
The shift has also rearranged trust in the two parties. In the same survey series in March 2025, AAPI adults were about evenly split over which party would better handle the economy and immigration; Democrats now lead by roughly 20 percentage points on both. About two-thirds of AAPI adults view the Republican Party unfavorably and only about one-quarter view it favorably. Opinions of the Democratic Party remain closely divided, with 48% viewing it unfavorably and 44% favorably.
Individual voters described competing considerations. Rebecca Larocco, 45, a Korean American living in Corning, Iowa, voted for Trump in 2016 and is leaning Republican again in this election, though she has questions about his handling of the economy and gas prices. Len Takahashi, 57, a Japanese American conservative in Universal City, Texas, said he wants to support candidates who put the economy first.
Election integrity weighs heavily as well: about half of AAPI adults say it is a major problem that eligible voters are kept from voting, about two-thirds say the same of foreign governments trying to influence election results, and about half are extremely or very concerned both about false information about candidates and about legal challenges to the results.
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Source: GSM · USA (original Chinese edition)
Photo: 图：华盛顿（Washington, D.C.）一处投票站的投票间（2024年资料图），oscepa 摄，CC BY-SA 2.0，经 Wikimedia Commons。Photo: Voting booths at a polling station in Washington, D.C. (2024 file photo), by oscepa, CC BY-SA 2.0, via Wikimedia Commons.
