Less than half of Americans have favorable views of the leaders of top U.S. allies including Canada, the United Kingdom (U.K.), Germany and Israel, according to a new poll.
A Gallup poll released Tuesday found that 48 percent of American respondents view Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau favorably, while the U.K.’s Theresa May (46 percent) and German Chancellor Angela Merkel (39 percent) lag behind. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu was only viewed favorably by 37 percent of those surveyed.
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The results split differently among party lines, with Republicans surveyed holding a favorable view of Netanyahu (64 percent) and May (48 percent), and just 30 percent holding a favorable view of Trudeau. Republican respondents viewed Merkel favorably at the same level as they did Russian President Vladimir Putin (27 percent).
Republicans’ skepticism towards Trudeau and Merkel come amid President Trump’s frequent attacks aimed at the two leaders over issues of trade and immigration.
The president criticized Trudeau publicly in June after attending a NATO summit and discussing tariffs with the Canadian leader, tweeting that Trudeau was “very dishonest and weak” during their conversation.
Support for Putin, largely considered to be a U.S. adversary amid the intelligence community’s assessment of Russian hacking and meddling during the 2016 presidential election, has increased among Republicans and decreased among Democrats since 2014, the poll noted.
Democrats held favorable views of both Trudeau (67 percent) and May (54 percent) while just 17 percent viewed Netanyahu favorably. Even fewer (4 percent) reported having a favorable opinion of Putin.
Independent voters remained largely skeptical of all the foreign leaders in the poll, with no leaders of a U.S. ally breaking 50 percent favorability among political independents in the survey.
Gallup’s pollsters contacted 1,024 adults in all 50 states and Washington, D.C., between Aug. 1-12, and the poll’s margin of error is plus or minus 4 percentage points.