President Bush’s job approval slipped into the mid-40s in national polls released this week as he lost some support among men and other groups of core supporters.
Public approval for Bush slipped from 52 percent in a CNN-USA Today-Gallup poll over the weekend to 45 percent in that same poll released Thursday. A CBS News poll released earlier in the week found Bush’s approval slipping six points to 43 percent.
The Gallup poll found Bush losing support among men, self-described conservatives and churchgoers while the CBS poll found a drop among men and Republicans.
The polls come after Congress and the president intervened in the case of Terri Schiavo, a 41-year-old woman whose feeding tube had been removed. The federal intervention was widely unpopular, even with conservatives and evangelicals.
But Bush’s dip in the polls also comes at a time that gas prices have been on the rise and the president is involved in an uphill campaign for changes in Social Security.
The Gallup poll of 1,001 adults was taken Monday through Wednesday and has a margin of sampling error of plus or minus 3 percentage points. The CBS News poll of 737 adults was taken Monday and Tuesday and has a 4 percentage point margin of error.
