CNN Data Expert Predicts ‘Diddly-Squat’ Poll Bump From Trump Speech
President Donald Trump has been underwater just a few month just a few months into office, and his “State of the Union” address isn’t expected to change that, said data analyst Harry Enten.
Speaking with CNN on Wednesday morning, Enten explained, “State of the Union address, simply put, usually do diddly-squat-diddly-doo. Why do I say that? Because take a look here. Average shift in approval rating post State of the Union address since 1977, the average president has seen a shift of 0000 points when it comes to their approval rating. You look back at Trump’s first term. Well, I guess it’s a shift of one point, but when it’s 0 or 1 point, you know that State of the Unions, simply put, don’t really move the needle. To quote Stephen A. Smith, we don’t care.”
So, host Kate Boudin asked how things have historically looked after the speech.
While Enten said that Trump is a “unique” president, he still doesn’t see it happening because Trump is so far underwater.
“View of Trump’s speech to Congress was very positive among speech viewers who are more Republican than the electorate,” he explained.
A CBS News poll ahead of the address said that those who indicated they’d listen to the speech were 52 percent Republican, 27 percent Independent and 18 percent Democrat.
Despite the high Republican viewership, Enten said, “overall this was actually the least well-received speech” in the history of his joint-session speeches.
“We’re talking about 38 percent of speech viewers who viewed the speech very positively, and that is lower than in 2025, when it was 44 percent, lower than in 2019, when it was 59 percent lower than in 2018, when it was 48 percent, and lower than it was in 2017, when it was 57 percent. The bottom line is this: State of the Union addresses, simply put, do not move — traditionally speaking, the American electorate and this Trump speech especially so, is not likely to move things,” he said.
Enten said that Trump has been underwater for over a year. He has been tracking the daily Trump polls and shows the president sinking for the past 351 days. He expects it will continue since the speech was so poorly received.
